Last Friday, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has attacked the European Union and the IMF for imposing political conditions on an EU-IMF loan desperately needed.
Hungary asked for a 15-20 billion loan last November, but before they knew what was happening, they were warned that any money would depend on proving their commitment to democratic principles.
Viktor Orban's government has come in for criticism from the banking and political establishment since it enacted a series of laws and a new constitution which, the establishment says, curbs the Hungarian Central Bank's so-called independence. In other words, Hungary's leadership has quite sensibly put legislation in place which curtails the financial establishment's ability to asset strip the nation.
As the pressure has built on Orban to amend this legislation, he has become more outspoken. In an interview last Friday he said:
Creating political conditions -- for example over the justice system -- would amount to blackmail, which is unacceptable within the European Union
European nations are now expected to swallow the kinds of terms that African nations have had to deal with in the past, it seems.