Socialists accuse govt of lying in Sargentini report rebuttal

The opposition Socialist Party has accused the government of lying in a written rebuttal of the so-called Sargentini report. Socialist MEP Istvan Ujhelyi told a press conference on Friday that the 131-page government document contains "distortions, exaggerations and lies". He said it was a lie that the authors of the report had not conducted a personal investigation into the situation in Hungary before compiling the report. The claims that the government is committed to a diverse media landscape and that the law on the foreign funding of civil groups does not stigmatise NGOs receiving support from abroad were also false, he said.