World

Reuters

Hungary and Poland will set up a joint institute to assess the state of rule of law across European Union member states so that they are "not taken for fools" over allegations of rule of law breaches, Hungary's foreign minister said on Monday. After meeting Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau in Budapest, Peter Szijjarto said an EU report on the rule of law, which will soon be discussed in Brussels, was expected to be a political statement, rather than any well-founded assessment. "The aim of this institute of comparative law would be that we should not be taken for fools," Szijjarto said, adding that he had "had enough of some western European politicians using us as a punchbag".