Finnish Prime Minister Antti Rinne said on Sunday (29 September) that all EU countries looked ready to accept that EU funding should be made conditional on democratic principles, he told Finland’s public broadcaster YLE.

Finland, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency, is campaigning for the EU funding to be made conditional on rule-of-law criteria when the block agrees on its new multi-year budget.

Finnish presidency commits to linking rule of law with EU funding Finnish Prime Minister Antti Rinne told the European Parliament on Wednesday (17 July) that his country’s presidency of the Council of the EU would continue negotiations on how to link more closely the disbursement of EU funds with respect for the rule of law in member states.

A major innovation in the next long-term EU budget proposed by the European Commission is the conditionality between EU funding and the rule of law. But two countries that have held the EU Presidency since then, Bulgaria and Romania, have voiced their own clear rejection.

Bulgaria dislikes Commission plan to link EU funding to rule of law A major innovation in the next long-term EU budget proposed by the European Commission yesterday (2 May) is the conditionality between EU funding and the rule of law. But the country holding the EU Presidency voiced its own clear rejection.

“At the moment it seems all member states are ready to accept it,” Rinne said after meeting several EU leaders in Brussels on Friday ahead of a visit to Hungary and the Czech Republic on Monday.

Hungary and its ally Poland have been at odds with the European executive for years over policies it says are eroding democratic checks and balances in the former Communist states.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, whom Rinne is supposed to meet in Budapest on Monday, and his spokesman Zoltan Kovacs launched a series of attacks against Finland in August, criticising the Nordic country’s own constitutional practices among other things.

Finland, which ranks among the most democratic countries in the world in the Economist’s annual democracy index, has rejected Orbán’s criticism as unfounded.

“The aim is not to nail any single member state on the wall, but it’s about how to defend ordinary European people from the despotism of not abiding by the rule-of-law principles,” Rinne said.

Jyrki Katainen, the outgoing Finnish Commissioner, has been at the forefront of EU decision-makers seeking to link the disbursement of EU funds to member states with the respect of rule of law.