Orbán's biggest crisis?

Hungary has seen its biggest anti-government protests in years over the past couple of weeks. But just how dangerous is this moment for Viktor Orbán? This week our favourite Hungarysplainer Viktória Serdült joins us to decipher the scandal that has shaken his government. We're also talking about the legalisation of gay marriage in Greece (finally!) and a Dutch court case that could have far-reaching consequences for the war in Gaza.

Viktória is a journalist at hvg.hu. You can find her on Twitter here and her article about Hungary's EU elections can be found here in EUObserver.

This week's Inspiration Station offerings: 'Navalny' and 'Lost on Me' (Niente di vero) by Veronica Raimo.

The Dutch court ruling can be found here and Euronews' piece on European military supplies to Israel can be found here.

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

INTRODUCTION - 00’22”

DOMINIC: Hello, and welcome to The Europeans podcast. We spend our weeks reading about what's going on in Europe so you don't have to, apart from in this one weekly dose of chatter that we put into your heads every Thursday.

KATY: That's a very pithy summary of what we do.

D: Thank you. I'm worried I maybe over-promise, though, in saying that we’re gonna summarise everything that's happened in Europe.

K: I also didn't spend my *entire* week reading about what was happening in Europe, full disclosure. I did spend a good chunk of it reading about Europe, though.

D: What did you spend the rest of the week doing?

K: Well, to be honest, I spent quite a lot of it reeling over the news from Russia last week about Alexei Navalny, as you did too, I imagine.

D: Yeah, incredibly sad and depressing news. Seems like Putin is just more and more emboldened to do whatever he wants to ensure that his power is untouched.

K: Yeah. And it's really one of those stories that seems to have sent shockwaves across the whole of Europe, and the world, really. And because it's such a huge story, it is one of those stories that we do feel has been covered really very well by the rest of the media. So we're going to be focusing on some other stories this week. What are we going to be talking about Dominic? 

D: Well, we’ll first, have Good Week, Bad Week coming up for you, as always, but then we're going to be heading to the country, actually, that has the closest ties to Putin's regime within the EU, that is Hungary. Because there's been a pretty politically tumultuous time in Hungary for the autocratic Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Two of the most prominent female politicians from his party Fidesz were forced to resign due to a pardoning scandal around a child sex abuse case. It's been described as Orbán's biggest crisis yet, but how serious is it for him? This week, we're going to be joined by one of our favourite Hungarian people, Viktória Serdült, amazing journalist from one of the few remaining independent outlets in Hungary, HVG. But first, it's time for…

GOOD WEEK - 02’29”

K: Who has had a good week? 

D: I'm giving Good Week to Greece after their parliament voted to legalise same-sex marriage. 

K: Yay!

D: Greece became the first Orthodox Christian country and the 16th country in the European Union to legalise same-sex marriage. Just 11 EU countries to go now, catch up guys.

K: Chop chop. 

D: It was a policy from the centre-right prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, but in the end, the bill actually only passed through Greece's parliament due to support from politicians from outside of his party, something that was necessary because Mitsotakis got a lot of pushback from MPS within his own party, New Democracy, and even from some of his ministers. 51 of the party's 158 MPs either voted against the bill or abstained from voting, alongside all the far-right MPs in the Greek parliament. But the bill still passed with a majority thanks to this rare show of cross-party support from the main left-wing opposition parties. 

K: So it's the first Orthodox country to legalise gay marriage and a country where the Church has still got quite a strong presence, I think, in some parts of society. What did they have to say about this?

D: Well, as you can expect, they weren't too pleased about it. The ecumenical patriarchate, which is based in Istanbul and heads up all Orthodox churches, they came out against this bill and Greece's senior bishops actively campaigned against it as well, asserting that ‘marriage is the union of a man and a woman, and that is the source of life’. Greek bishops actually threatened to excommunicate lawmakers who supported the bill. 

K: Wow. 

D: But it passed anyway, so there.

K: And why did Mitsotakis decide to push for this law, knowing that so many of his own MPs were going to have a problem with it? 

D: Maybe because it's the right thing to do? 

K: Alright, sassy!

D: Yes, sorry, that is rather sassy. And maybe I'm wrong. But hey, who knows? That could be part of his thinking. And he is from the liberal wing of his own party, so it's a policy that lines up broadly with his political ideology. You may remember that Mitsotakis won a landslide re-election victory last summer. So perhaps he also chose this moment, far from another election, to pass the bill even if it's not entirely popular with all of his party's political base. And he made some pretty good points while making the case for this bill, arguing that marriage is nothing but the culmination of the love of two people. He said, ‘We are talking about something that is already in effect in 36 countries and on five continents. And nowhere does it appear to have damaged social cohesion.’ But of course, this is politics. So there could be other reasons why he decided to pass this bill now. Some analysts think it was a politically savvy decision because it presents Mitsotakis on the world stage as a modernist, as socially liberal at a time when his political reputation is in danger, both nationally and internationally. Earlier this month, the European Parliament passed a resolution expressing concern about very serious threats to European Union values in Greece. They hone in on three main concerns: media freedom, the use of spyware against political opponents, and police violence and mistreatment against migrants. Really very serious allegations that threaten the rule of law in Greece. So perhaps he hoped that by passing this bill, it would take the focus away from those allegations and make him seem more like an acceptable politician on the world stage again. But who knows? One thing that I found interesting about this bill was that it wasn't only some of his MPs that were against the bill, but also recent opinion polls suggested that a narrow majority of the Greek public oppose same sex marriage. 

K: Oh, wow, a majority are opposed to it? 

D: Yeah. Something that I found a bit depressing. But you could also argue that the opinion of the general Greek public shouldn't be relevant, like. public opinion should not be the leading thing in a case like this. You don't need a majority of the public to agree with granting equal rights for a minority group of people, I would argue. 

K: Also it's one of those moments where you just think, what are these polls gonna say in five years time? I bet you'll see a huge change. 

D: Yeah, I hope so. 

K: And does it just legalise same-sex marriage, this bill, or is there also stuff in there about you know, like, gay couples adopting kids and stuff like that?

D: The bill also allows same-sex couples to adopt. However, it excludes same-sex couples from surrogacy, which is something that activists were hoping for, and it also only offers limited access to assisted reproduction procedures. This is allowed for women, single or married, who are unable to reproduce for medical reasons. So it's certainly by no means a perfect bill in the eyes of the LGBTQ plus community. There is especially big disappointment that the bill doesn't include provisions for trans and gender nonconforming people that were hoped to be included. But it's definitely progress, so Good Week goes to Greece. Enjoy it. 

K: Good week, Greece.

BAD WEEK - 7’47”

D: Who's had a bad week?

K: Yeah, I would argue that European defence companies are probably feeling quite rattled this week. And that is because of a ruling by the Dutch appeals court, ordering the Dutch government to block all exports of components for F-35 fighter jets to Israel. The case was brought by three NGOs against the Dutch government, and the court agreed with their argument that there is a serious risk of these plane components being used to make fighter jets that are in turn being used by the Israeli government to commit serious violations of international law.

D: I live here in the Netherlands, but I realised I don't actually have any idea of how big a player the Netherlands is in the defence industry and, like, the manufacturing of parts of planes. How big a player is it?

K: Not huge, actually. So the European defence industry is really dominated by a few very large companies that make weapons and military equipment. So you've got BAE in the UK, Thales in France, Finmeccanica in Italy. There's also, of course, Airbus, which is a pan-European company and a really big player in the defence market. But they're one of many companies in the sector that don't just make weapons, they also make, like, commercial planes. But in general, no, the Netherlands is not a huge player in this market. The reason that this ruling took place in the first place is because the Netherlands is home to a warehouse in Woensdrecht, which is in the south of the Netherlands. And from that warehouse, parts that get used to make F-35 fighter jets get sent to a bunch of different countries that use these fighter jets. Those countries include several in Europe, but also, it turns out, Israel.

D: And what kind of planes are these F-35s?

K: Yeah, so just in case you don't know much about fighter jets, and why would you, the F-35 is a very sophisticated plane. It's made by the US defence company Lockheed Martin, and it's considered to be the most sophisticated fighter jet in the world. It has a really powerful engine, super advanced radar, and it has all of these fancy stealth features which make it hard to detect as it's coming in. And it was no surprise when Israel became the first government outside the US to receive these fighter jets back in 2016, the two are obviously very close allies. And right now, the F-35 is one of a few different models of US-made fighter jet that are being used by Israel in its ongoing bombardment of Gaza. Now, this podcast is probably not the best place for full-scale debate on whether or not Israel has committed war crimes in response to the horrific attacks by Hamas on October 7. So I'll just stick to telling you what was argued in this Dutch court case. The three human rights groups that launched this case, they argued that these F-35 fighter jets could be used in serious violations of international humanitarian law. And the court agreed with them, I'll just read you a bit of the judgement. It said: “Israel does not take sufficient account of the consequences of its attacks for the civilian population. Israel's attacks on Gaza have resulted in a disproportionate number of civilian casualties, including thousands of children. The Netherlands is party to several international regulations, which stipulate that if a clear risk of serious violations of international humanitarian law exists, the Netherlands has the obligation to prevent the export of military equipment. This means that the export of F-35 parts from the Netherlands to Israel has to be stopped.

D: That's a pretty clear ruling. 

K: Yeah. 

D: But the Dutch government are not so happy about it, are they?

K: They're not, no. So they've already appealed this case. They've argued that a court shouldn't be making foreign policy – that's *their* job. Which is an interesting debate that we've had on this podcast before, you know? Should courts be able to change government policy?

D: Yeah, I actually read an interesting tweet thread on Twitter from a Dutch judge pushing back against that idea that the judge is sidelining democracy, because actually, the opposite is true. The Dutch parliament has decided to bind the Netherlands to humanitarian law by signing onto treaties. So if a government then doesn't follow those treaties, it's the courts’ role to make sure that the government does.

K: Yep. Courts exist for a reason. But yeah, this is a major headache for the Dutch government. They've previously been very proud to play a key logistical role in the F-35 programme and hosting this warehouse. The F-35 programme, of course, is this elite club of US allies that have access to these super sophisticated fighter jets. I should add that even though it still wants to be able to transport these plane parts to Israel, the Dutch government added in its statement that it continues to call for an immediate temporary humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, and that clearly, Israel must abide by international law. So yes, this is a headache for the Dutch government. It's also a major headache for Lockheed Martin, the American company that makes these planes. Unless this ruling gets overturned by the Supreme Court, Lockheed Martin is going to have to make major changes to its supply chains and find another way of getting them to Israel, if indeed it wants to continue doing that.

D: Could this Dutch court case open the door to other similar court cases across Europe against defence companies? 

K: Yeah, well, that's certainly what Oxfam, the Dutch wing of Oxfam have suggested about the case. They were one of the three NGOs that brought this case against the Dutch government along with PAX and The Rights Forum. And Oxfam said in response to the ruling, ‘We hope that this verdict can encourage other countries to follow suit.’ And you would think that NGOs sitting in other European countries, even if they have slightly different legal systems, they might look at this case and think, ‘You know, maybe the strategy could work here.’ There have been lots of protests outside arms factories in various European countries over the issue of supplying Israel. But this legal strategy has just been shown to be pretty effective, in this one case at least. And that is why I'm giving Bad Week to the European defence industry as a whole. Because even this case is in theory just about a warehouse in Woensdrecht, I think it could end up being significantly bigger than that. And the longer that this awful war drags on – we're now at more than 28,000 Palestinians killed since Israel began bombarding Gaza – the more opinion seems to be shifting even among governments that have previously been pretty friendly with Israel. It was interesting to see the EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell urging Israel's allies, especially the United States, to stop selling weapons to Israel, if they're as concerned as they say they are about how many people are being killed.

[SOUND CLIP: Let's be logical. How many times have you heard the most prominent leaders and foreign ministers around the world saying too many people are being killed? President Biden said, ‘This is too much on the top. It’s not not proportional.’ Well, if you believe that too many people are being killed, aybe you should provide less arms.]

K: But of course, even if that statement was aimed primarily at Joe Biden, as this Dutch case shows, the US is far from the only government supplying Israel with weapons and military equipment that have been directly used for the bombardment of Gaza. There was quite an interesting piece in Euronews back in November, about the European countries that are supplying Israel, and it found that Italy and Germany were key suppliers along with the UK. I'll post that article in the show notes. But yeah, I mean, even if this Dutch case ends up getting overturned by the Supreme Court, we could well see other NGOs in other countries launching similar lawsuits. I don't think we've seen the end of this story.

* * * 

D: We only still make this podcast because (a), people seem to want to listen to it, and (b), because some of those listeners are so kind and decided to part ways with a little bit of their hard-earned cash each month to keep this podcast podcasting.

K: Do we not also make it because we like doing it? 

D: Oh yeah. That's (c), okay? (c), because we like doing it. 

K: Thank you for clarifying.

D: We don't hate each other yet.

K: Not yeah! Six years, still going strong!

D: Are you thinking about whether or not you could also help us out? If so, head to patreon.com/europeanspodcast and you can donate from as little as two euros a month and receive various modest but charming benefits, depending on the amount you donate. 

K: We think they're charming, anyway. This week, a big thank you goes to our latest supporters: Marybel, Sonatengraf, J, Timothy, Andre, Tamar, Justyna, Charlie, and to Isaac for increasing his donations.

D: Thank you all so much. If you can't afford to support us right now, you could also help us out by telling a friend or two about this show or posting about us on social media – that also really helps us.

K: Those social media platforms what you can do that on include Mastodon now. I launched a Mastodon this week, Dominic. 

D: Ooh, is it fun there?

K: It's quite nice so far, yeah, I'm liking it.

D: I feel like we're being very slutty with our social media accounts at the moment. 

K: No shame in that.

D: Slut positivity.

INTERVIEW WITH VIKTÓRIA SERDÜLT - 17’01”

K: Let's go to Hungary, where the last couple of weeks have been punctuated by anti-government protests, including a huge protest in Budapest over the weekend – tens of thousands of people packed into Heroes Square. I feel like this is one of those stories that is really interesting, but probably only made it to, like, the Europe sub-page of most international news websites. 

D: Yeah.

K: But that is why we exist as a podcast, it’s to shove those stories up the agenda. Why have lots of Hungarians been taking to the streets over the past couple of weeks? Our guest is going to do a much better job of explaining that, but in brief, it turns out that Hungary's president pardoned a man who had been convicted of helping to cover up a child abuse scandal. The man in question was the deputy director of a state-run children's home, his boss had preyed on the children who live there. It's a really horrific case. And then his deputy, the man who was pardoned, he had pressured victims of the sexual abuse to retract their stories. This man was sentenced to jail time for his role in covering up the abuse, three years in jail. But then he was pardoned, somewhat mysteriously, by Hungary's then President Katalin Novák in April last year, and it's only recently come to light, the fact that this pardoned man had had a role in trying to cover up the sexual abuse of children. And it’s sparked this huge scandal in Hungary and the most serious anti-government protests in years. Novák has now had to resign as president along with former justice minister Judit Varga. So we have a lot of questions, as do many Hungarians. Why on earth was this man pardoned in the first place? And what happens now? Orbán is the longest serving leader in the EU. He's been prime minister, this time around, since 2010. Is this a serious threat to the rule of one of the most authoritarian leaders in Europe? With us to discuss these questions and more is returning guest Viktória Serdült, a reporter at one of the few independent outlets left in Orbán’s Hungary, HVG. We gave her a ring in Budapest.

* * *

Hi, Viktória.

VIKTÓRIA SERDÜLT: Hi, guys. 

D: Hey.

V: Nice to see you again.

K: Nice to have you back. Always happy to have our favourite Hungarysplainer back on the show.

V: Well, we have a lot of things to explain from the last two weeks, that's for sure.

K: Yeah, definitely. 

D: So much has been going on. Last time you were on the show we were talking about Viktor Orbán’s success in transforming so much of the media landscape in Hungary so that it's full of journalists who support him and his political agenda. So my first question is this. Are Hungarians actually hearing about this scandal in the Orbán-friendly media? And if so, how is the story being presented to them?

V: Well, the interesting thing is that this is a scandal so big that it's even portrayed in the pro-government media. It didn't happen in the first few days after the pardoning scandal broke out. So that was just the usual stuff, only independent media covering it. But the scandal grew so big, and pardoning the accomplice of a paedophile was such a big issue, that it even reached those people who basically support Fidesz. So that's when the pro-government media started covering it. And we had articles and sources telling us Fidesz had inside polls asking their own supporters what they think of the scandal, whether they think Judit Varga or Katalin Novák should resign. And after the results of the polls came in, that's when the government media started covering it. So yes, this is a scandal that basically reached every corner of society. But it was interesting because they already started framing it, and the big message of government media was that it was a mistake to pardon the accomplice of a paedophile, but at least Judit Varga and President Novák, they took responsibility for their actions and they resigned, and this is something that we should thank them for, even if they did a mistake.

K: Because I mean, it seems like a very strange move for a government to go out of its way, or for a president to go out of their way, to pardon the deputy director of an orphanage who had been involved in covering up child abuse. How much do we know about why this man was pardoned? 

V: Basically nothing. Because in Hungary, the law says that the president doesn't have to give an explanation for the pardon. So we know nothing about the case itself. But interestingly enough, a few days after this scandal broke out, there was an article in the pro-government outlet Magyar Nemzet, an anonymous source – so there was not even a journalist that it was assigned to. And it was the story of the person involved, protecting him saying that he's such a good person, that he was behaving very well in prison, that he was already under house arrest when the pardon was given, his sick mother lives in Transylvania. So that was a strange article, and basically that the only source that we have of the person himself.

D: Okay, so there's a lot that's still unknown. But what we do know is that these two very prominent women from Orbán’s party have resigned, two of the pretty few prominent women in Hungarian politics. Do we know how much of the blame for the pardon actually lies with these two women or whether to some extent, they seem to have been obliged to take the blame? 

V: Basically, not a few of the most prominent women – they were the *only* prominent women in Fidesz. We now have a government that's composed entirely of men, and we don't have a president. So that's the two most important women being gone. And also, they were very, very important figures for Fidesz, because Viktor Orbán wanted to put them in charge of the European elections. Basically they were the ones responsible for the pardon technically. President Novák was the one who gave the pardon, and Judit Varga was the one as justice minister to counter-sign it. So of course, they were the ones who had to take the blame. But there's another very important figure which is not widely talked about. And his name is Zoltán Balog, and he is the bishop of the Reformed Hungarian Church. He used to be minister for human capacities a few years ago, and he still has very good connections with the government. And there were some very good investigative articles saying that he was basically the one who persuaded Novák to give the pardon. So actually, a week after the whole story broke out, he had to resign as bishop from the Church. The interesting thing is that Viktor Orbán was asked whether he knew about the pardon before it was given. And he didn't communicate at all. One of his ministers said that Viktor Orbán actually knew of the scandal from the papers. And this time, I actually believe him, because the president's office is sort of independent from the prime minister's office and there could be a chance that he only knew about it after it was given. 

K: There's also another character that's got a quite intriguing role in this whole thing, a previous close ally of Orbán, this guy Péter Magyar. And he's now speaking out very vocally, against Orbán. He’s this influential person with close connections to Fidesz; he also happens to be the ex husband of Judit Varga, the former justice minister who's had to resign over this. And it's really interesting because he's not just been criticising the government over the child abuse scandal. He seems to be trying to encourage much wider anger at Fidesz over things that have changed under Orbán, not least how a small circle of people have become very, very rich under Orbán. What game do you think he's playing here?

V: That's the million dollar question we're trying to solve here at HVG as well, and I think all the newspapers are trying to uncover his motives. But we haven't found them yet. You said it very well, that he used to be the husband of justice minister Judit Varga, so he does know a lot. And for years, he used to be a diplomat in Brussels, and then afterwards, he was on the board of state companies. So he knows the system from inside. He did promise a lot of insider scoops from the government, but he basically failed to deliver them. He hasn't uncovered any big scandal, he has only hinted at scandals on his Facebook page. So at this moment, we think he's just looking for attention. He gave a long interview to one of the TV channels last Sunday, and that interview has been viewed more than 2 million times, which is quite big in a country of 10 million. So if he wants to uncover a scandal or just give out a message, he already has a big number of followers. So I think he's just building himself up for something that's coming. But we have no idea what's coming. 

K: Intriguing.

V: I think many government members are really pissed off at Magyar and his action because he used to be an insider. It's not customary in Fidesz and in the circles of Viktor Orbán to, like, go public with insider knowledge and what you know about the party itself.

D: Yeah, and along that same path, I was wondering, would you say this is the worst crisis Orbán has faced in all his years in power? Can you remember any moment when he's come closer to losing control of the narrative?

V: I would say it's one of the biggest. Basically, I counted the scandals, the biggest scandals he had in the last 10 years or 12 years. And I found five of them. And it's interesting to see how he managed to stay in power after all of them. They had the big scandal of European Parliament Member József Szájer in Brussels, who was caught escaping from a drain pipe after attending an orgy in Brussels – 

D: During lockdown, right? 

V: Yes, during lockdown. So that was a big scandal. And then we had the president Pál Schmitt, who also had to resign because it turns out that he plagiarised his PhD. 

D: Woah.

V: Then we had Zsolt Borkai, the mayor of Győr. It's a small town in Hungary. And he had to resign from the mayor's office because he was caught on video having sex with prostitutes on a yacht. So that's, again, see, we have so many sex abuse scandals in Hungary nowadays. Returning to the original question, this is not the first big scandal that rocked Fidesz, but I think this will have long-term effects.

K: This one is different because it involves kids, right? And I mean, the thing that makes it feel different, I guess, is that Orbán claims his political raison d’être is to protect the family. And so because of that, it feels bigger than all of those scandals. Do you think his moves to contain the fallout from this have been enough?

V: The reason I said that it's going to have long-term effects is exactly because of what you mentioned, that protecting children is the core message of Fidesz and the whole government. Not only protecting children, protecting families. And this went totally against the core message that they're trying to give out to supporters and the whole country and even the international stage. So I think this is the biggest credibility scandal of Fidesz, that whatever they do, however they might contain it, because at this moment, it seems that the scandal is sort of over for now. But I think, ‘How can you look into the eyes of your voters and say that you are protecting children, knowing that basically, the president pardoned somebody who was involved in a sex abuse scandal of minors in a children's home?’

D: And are we seeing any effect in the polls? 

V: Not yet. I think the biggest test will be the European Parliament elections, and then also with the municipal elections that we're going to have on the same day as the European Parliamentary elections. I think Fidesz has lost some of its supporters. But it's really still a question whether the opposition can take advantage of this scandal. And the polls show that it's going to be basically the smaller anti-establishment parties that are going to win supporters including the Two-Tailed Dog Party, who are basically a satirical anti-establishment party. And then the other one is Our homeland, Mi Hazánk in Hungarian, which is an extreme right party. And they're going to be the ones who might get into the European Parliament as fresh faces.

K: And if Fidesz does perform poorly in the municipal and EU elections, do you think that would be a sign that they're in serious trouble?

V: I don't think so. My opinion as a journalist is that the only chance of the downfall of Fidesz it's going to come from within, it's not going to happen in an election. And that's why this Péter Magyar story is so important. And the other thing is, I talked to some pollsters saying that the problem is that the opposition is so fragmented that three or four of them will not get the necessary votes to get MEP seats. And then that means that Fidesz, even though they have 40% supporters instead of 45 or 50, that they used to have, like, back in five years ago, they're going to have the same number of seats.

K: I just have one question left for you and it's an extra depressing one, so sorry. But this scandal was revealed by an independent outlet, 444. Some people suggested that the government is going to react to the scandal by cracking down even further on what is left of the independent Hungarian media. How worried about that are you?

V: I'm not worried at all. Actually, they can't crack down any more than they do already. Honestly, we've been having a hard time under the Orbán government for so long, that I think uncovering one scandal is not going to make a difference.

* * * 

D: I find it really interesting what she said about the fact that so many of the scandals from Fidesz circles have had a sexual element to them. And I'm certainly no psychologist, so I really don't know, but I do wonder if this isn't a coincidence, if there is actually a link between a political ideology that encourages repression of your sexuality, and sexually transgressive behaviour. If anyone knows of any studies or specialists who talk about this well, then please do get in touch. But yeah, it's pretty sad that it seems that these scandals don't seem to make much of a dent in Fidesz’s support.

K: Well, that's a good question, isn't it? I'm really intrigued to see whether the scandal now has any impact on how Fidesz perform in the European elections, especially because they were going to be led by Judit Varga, this former justice minister who was actually quite a visible politician. I feel like even internationally, we heard from her quite a lot, having these fiery exchanges with Brussels in the past. So that's going to be very interesting to watch in June. And actually, Viktória has an article about Hungary and the elections, so you will find a link to that right there on the screen.

THE INSPIRATION STATION - 32’33”

D: Time to roll into the Inspiration Station to have a little chat about some cultural goodies from this continent. What have you been enjoying this week, Katy?

K: I finished a book.

D: Well done!

K: I say that like it's a massive life achievement, but I have a five month old baby and a full-time job. So what can I say?

D: That is seriously impressive. 

K: It was a big moment for me. The book that I decided to read – and finish – was Lost On Me by Veronica Raimo, or to give its original Italian title, it is ‘Niente di vero’. And I'm sure that the Italians joining us will be like, ‘Where have you been?’ because this book was a big hit in Italy. But it's only come out in English fairly recently. And it was exactly the book that I wanted to read as someone who is struggling to find time to read, in that it’s a short and funny novel. It's about a young woman living in a quite eccentric, dysfunctional family in Rome. She later goes on to live in Berlin. And it's kind of semi-autobiographical. It's loosely based on Veronica Romo's own life. But as you can guess from the title, ‘none of this is true’, you're never really sure what *is* true. She's a deeply unreliable narrator. And it really plays with this boundary between truth and fiction. But yeah, it made me laugh out loud more than a few times which is what I need right now. And it's also surprisingly poignant at other moments. So I enjoyed it very, very much. It's called ‘Lost On Me’, or ‘Niente di vero’, and it’s by Veronica Raimo.

D: Sounds great. Auto-fiction is really having a moment right now.

K: Is it? 

D: Yeah, like Edouard Louis.

K: Ah, yeah, of course.

D: And Chris Kraus. I'd really like to read this, I'm going to order it.

K: Add it to your collection. What have you been watching this week? 

D: Well, because of the sad and suspicious and premature death of Alexei Navalny, I thought I’d talk this week about the documentary about him that came out in 2022 and actually won the Oscar back then for best documentary. I saw it a while ago, but I thought it was worth mentioning again. It's called Navalny, and it seems to be available a lot at the moment, lots of public broadcasters across Europe putting it up on their streaming services again, so have a hunt. It's an amazing film. It follows Alexei after an attempted assassination that took place in 2020 using the nerve agent novichok, and the film is as much about him himself as it is about the work of investigative journalists at Bellingcat. I was completely blown away by it when I saw it. It's also just mind-blowing how brave Navalny was in deciding to go back to Russia after he recovered, aware of the risks involved. So I really recommend you go and watch this film, if you haven't seen it yet.

K: There's this clip from the film that's been going around social media, maybe you saw it. But it really struck me, this clip, because it's been quite hard to find any glimmer of hope in his death. Like all of the headlines say things like, ‘Russia's lost hope has died.’ 

D: Yeah. 

K: And so it feels kind of fitting to me that the only person with anything hopeful to say about it is Navalny himself. There’s this clip from the film where he was asked, What's your message to the Russian people if you're killed?’

[SOUND CLIP]

K: And he says, ‘It's very obvious, my message to you, if I die, is you can't give up. You're not allowed to give up. If they kill me it's a sign of how strong we are. And the only thing that's necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.’

[SOUND CLIP]

K: So yeah, a powerful message from beyond the grave.

HAPPY ENDING - 36’33”

D: This week's Happy Ending comes from a team of researchers in the USA and Germany who have been studying the behaviours of young chimps, orangutans, bonobos and gorillas in San Diego Zoo and in Leipzig Zoo. And after analysing 75 hours of footage, they have concluded that juvenile great apes – so, young great apes – enjoy teasing and annoying their elders. They identified lots of different types of teasing, including body-slamming, hair-pulling, hitting and poking, tickling, stealing, and generally inserting themselves into another's personal space.

K: Quite violent, some of this.

D: Yeah, I mean, they are apes. 

K: Fair enough. 

D: One of my favourite things about this study was that they noticed that just like with us humans, if the teasing was ignored by the elder, it was in most cases followed up by more teasing, repetitive teasing, some extra pokes or even an escalation of the teasing until they got a response.

K: This is such great toddler strategy. 

D: It really is.

K: Was there any difference in behaviour between the American chimps and the German chimps?

D: That I don't know? I don't think so. 

K: I'm interested in the cultural differences. 

D: The other question they couldn't answer was like, why do they tease each other? So we don't have a conclusion to like why in evolutionary terms teasing has developed, but it does seem to be clear that they definitely are enjoying it. And it makes me feel a bit better about my desire to tease people. It's not my fault I want to do it. It's just something I inherited from my primate ancestors 13 million years ago.

K: Yes, blame your ape cousins. 

* * *

K: We're away next week, listeners, but we will be in your feeds. nonetheless. It's coming up to two years since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. And that anniversary has been on our minds a lot. So we wanted to replay you a story that we recorded this time two years ago, read by Olesya Khromeychuk. That will be in your feeds this time next week. 

D: In the meantime, you can catch us on all those social medias that we're trying out. Twitter @europeanspod, Instagram @europeans podcast, Mastodon… what is it? 

K: Same one, @europeanspodcast.

D: Threads @europeanspodcast. Any others? 

K: I think that's it. 

D: I'm ghosting Blue Sky. There are only so many hours in the day. 

K: That's the limit on our slutty behaviour. 

D: Have a good week everyone.

K: Thanks for listening, bye! 

D: Viszlát!