The European Commission may make a positive decision on Wednesday to allocate 10 billion euros to Hungary, for which the Hungarian parliament must pass the last element of judicial reform required by Brussels on Tuesday, and the law will be published in the Official Gazette on the same day. This was reported by the liberal Hungarian newspaper Nepszava.
"According to independent sources, the earliest the Commission can give its blessing to unblock 10 billion euros is on Wednesday, as part of the so-called written procedure," the report said.
Politico journalists reported earlier that the Commission would make this decision on Tuesday. However, the Hungarian publication received a denial from European officials regarding this information.
Over the past year, the Hungarian government has taken several steps to defuse Brussels' discontent over judicial reform, and now it only needs to amend the latest law to accomplish this task. Budapest must guarantee Hungarian judges unimpeded access to the Court of Justice of the European Union.
While some EU sources have expressed reservations about the implementation of the judicial reform, President Ursula von der Leyen and members of the European Commission do not share the concerns on a technical level and are likely to express a positive assessment of the Hungarian government and parliament's decision on Wednesday.
This could mean that Hungary will receive almost half of the 22 billion euros from the Cohesion Fund that the EU is currently holding back. The money will be paid by Brussels over several years.
Note that the payments can be stopped at any time if it turns out that Hungary violates EU standards. The move would be a major victory for Hungarian autocrat Viktor Orban, who has been blocking EU decision-making and torpedoing the EU's response to Russia's war at a key summit of European leaders that begins Thursday.
