Kovacs: 'Rule of law warriors' pushing political agenda

Proponents of the idea of tying European Union budget allocations to member states' respect for the rule of law are unable to define what that mechanism should be and are simply waging an ideological battle, Zoltan Kovacs, the state secretary for international communications, wrote in an op-ed for Brussels-based news portal Euractiv. One of the reasons for the current debate around the EU's next multi-year budget is that certain member states "continue to push for the so-called conditionality mechanism, which would place conditions on budget allocations to member states based on nebulous rule-of-law criteria", Kovacs wrote. The European Council decisively rejected this idea at a meeting in July, he said. Even German Chancellor Angela Merkel, he added, affirmed that a rule-of-law mechanism would require the consent of all member states as well as an amendment of the EU treaties, the state secretary wrote.