By Henry Srebrnik, [Charlottown, PEI] Guardian

A new framework for the relationship between the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, known as the Visegrad Group, was established in 1991. The four had always been part of a single European civilization sharing cultural and intellectual values and common religious traditions.

The objective at the time was to promote the European integration of the four countries, following the collapse of the Soviet-controlled Communist bloc. They had returned to a democratic Europe after decades of Soviet domination.

The tragic historical experience of the new member states gave them a strong sense of the positive nature of their regained national sovereignty. This set them apart from the Western European members of the EU who founded and shaped it.

Today these four nations are members of the EU and NATO, and so have become part of the post-Soviet European framework. But of late two of them, Poland and Hungary, are finding EU membership a threat to their hard-won post-Communist sovereignty.

As Frank Furedi notes in his book Populism and the European Culture Wars: The Conflict of Values Between Hungary and the EU, the contrast is between the largely top-down value system of the EU “empire” and the elites that subscribe to it, versus the organic values of the national community.

Poland and Hungary have been at odds with the Commission over issues ranging from media freedoms, migration, LGBTQ rights to judicial independence.

The 2008 economic crisis and the 2011 Euro debt crisis made them wonder whether the older EU members, in particular Germany, were reliable partners. The consequent adoption of austerity policies in the EU strengthened this assumption.

The 2015 refugee and migration crisis added to their unease. Their approach diverges significantly from that of the EU bureaucracy in Brussels. They mostly disagree with quota principle of distribution of refugees and migrants.

The outcome of the 2016 Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom also increased their Euroscepticism. Increasingly worried about their national identity, they now chafe at the EU’s operating institutional framework, which overrides many of their own political goals.

Poland, by far the largest Visegrad member, is also the country currently most unhappy with EU membership. Its nationalistic Law and Justice Party (PiS) threatens to part ways with Brussels. And Hungary, ruled by the Hungarian Civic Alliance-Fidesz, is not far behind.

Poland’s parliament has now passed a law allowing border guards to immediately expel migrants who cross the border illegally. It also has said it will build a fence on its border with Belarus.

Since August, there have been more than 16,000 attempts to cross the Belarusian border illegally compared with just 120 for the whole of last year.

Poland and the EU have accused Belarus’s authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko of facilitating an influx of thousands of migrants. He is trying to destabilise neighbouring member states as a form of retaliation against sanctions.

Poland and Hungary are also furious at a report presented last July by the European Commission on the state of the rule of law in EU member states. It described the situation in Poland and Hungary, in particular, as highly problematic. Among other things, it demanded judicial reform in both countries. Otherwise, EU funding of tens of billions of euros in post-pandemic recovery funds would be in danger.

In December 2020, all 27 EU member states had agreed to link respect for the rule of law to the access of EU funds. Hungary and Poland only consented on condition they were allowed to challenge this in court.

Warsaw and Budapest called the July ruling an example of bad faith, blackmail, political attack, and double standards. The Polish government argued that national judiciary systems fall outside the scope of EU authority.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki therefore requested a review of the decision of the EU’s Court of Justice that gave EU law primacy.

Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal on Oct. 7 ruled that key articles of one of the EU’s primary treaties were incompatible with Polish law, in effect rejecting the principle that EU law has primacy over national legislation in certain judicial areas.

The Constitutional Tribunal is now dominated by judges who are sympathetic to the party, one of whom was appointed illegally, according to the European Court of Human Rights.

But the European Commission responded quickly, asserting that the Court of Justice has primacy over national courts or constitutional tribunals in member countries. The Commission has said it would take steps to enforce its judgments.

Meanwhile, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban signed a resolution Oct. 9 supporting the Polish court ruling. “Efforts are being made to deprive member states of powers they never ceded to the EU without amending the EU treaties and through creeping extensions of competences,” it stated.

Orban appears to positively relish antagonising the EU, regularly vetoing EU attempts at a unified front on foreign policy.

An article in Magyar Nemzet, a newspaper allied with Orban’s party, in August argued that “it’s time to talk about Huxit.” This, as well as “Polexit,” are seen in some quarters as a possibility, though still remote.