The Chinese university will open the Budapest campus while Orban leans towards Beijing

Hungary will host the only Chinese university operating within the EU in a sign of deepening ties between the government of Viktor Orban and Beijing.

The Hungarian government will donate 2.2m euros to Shanghai-based Fudan University for its new campus in Budapest, which authorities said would start operating in 2024.

The announcement comes a year and a half after the Central European University, founded by billionaire philanthropist George Soros and formerly the country’s top institution, was forced into exile by Orban’s nationalist regime after nearly 30 years in the Hungarian capital.

In October, European Court of Justice said the move against the CEU violates Hungary ‘s commitments under the World Trade Organization and violates the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights in relation to academic freedom.

Agnes Szunomar, a researcher at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, said the government’s agreement with Fudan “is about unconditional love between Hungary and China”.

“Many countries in Europe have different agreements with Chinese universities and many European universities cooperate with their Chinese counterparts,” Ms. Szunomar said.

However, she added that the agreement to bring Fudan to Budapest was proof that Hungary is ready to reduce its education system by bringing in a foreign competitor with greater global prestige and more resources than any domestic institution. Fudan, Mrs. Szunomar said, with its huge budget and capacity to issue dual degrees, it could lure top academic talent from Hungarian universities, causing a “brain drain”.

Fudan, who ranks 34th in QS World University Rankings, will offer programs in international relations, economics, medicine and technical sciences for up to 6,000 students. Until the opening of the Budapest campus, joint degree programs with four Hungarian universities will be offered.

“When it comes to prestige, I would have waited [Fudan] to be located in London, Berlin, Paris, ”or a similar global capital, said Tamas Matura, founder of the Center for Central and Eastern European Studies and assistant professor at Corvinus University in Budapest.

But today’s Hungary, in which Mr Orban’s allies have consistently consolidated control over the media and many of the country’s institutions, is “a politically very secure environment”, he said.

“In Western Europe, they [Fudan] “It may face unrest or political scrutiny, but in Hungary, they have nothing to fear.”

Ties between Hungary and China have grown since Orban returned to power in 2010. Hungary hosts Huawei Telecom Group’s largest supply center outside China. The company accounts for 0.5 per cent of the country’s employment, 0.4 per cent of Hungary’s gross domestic product and 0.4 per cent of total tax revenue, according to a STUDY by Oxford Economics, a British marketing and consulting firm.

Last year, Hungary received a 20-year, $ 1.9 billion loan from Beijing to build a railway link to the Serbian capital, Belgrade. In April, as the Hungarian parliament voted to give the government extraordinary emergency powers, the legislature also voted to classify all details about the project, saying it would be necessary to secure a loan from the Chinese bank ExIm.

Hungary also expects five Confucius Institute, which China says help promote language learning and foster friendship between peoples. Critics in the US and Europe say the institutes facilitate the spread of pro-Chinese propaganda and are a mechanism for spying on students and faculties.

A Hungarian government spokesman said “Fudan Budapest Campus will significantly facilitate the establishment of high quality education infrastructure and raise the standard of education”. He also said he expected the opening of the campus to “give an impetus to further Chinese investment, especially the establishment of Chinese enterprise research and development centers in Hungary”.

Following the departure of the CEU, many observers have criticized the attacks on academic freedom in Hungary. In 2018, the government removed “gender studies” from the list of degrees that could be issued in the country. Some critics worry about the effect Fudan’s presence in the country could have.

In 2019, amid wider crackdowns on Chinese academics, Fudan removed from the statute a commitment to “freedom of thought,” sparking protests at the university. He added a clause saying Fudan “adheres to the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party and will fully implement the party’s education policy”.

Mr Matura noted that as Chinese repression continued, “those who tried to be a little more constructive in their criticism of China and its issues” were being penalized. “This is really a concern for us too,” he said.