Viktor Orbán’s brother detained in Hungarian people-smuggling inquiry, prime minister says
Péter Magyar said the former Hungarian leader’s brother was in custody as authorities investigated an alleged scheme involving Vietnamese visa applicants.
By Amit Ricci ·
Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar has said that the brother of his predecessor, Viktor Orbán, has been detained in connection with an investigation into people-smuggling. The announcement comes as Magyar’s government pursues an anti-corruption campaign focused on allegations concerning Orbán’s 16 years in power.
Speaking in Berlin, where he was delivering a speech, Magyar identified the detained man as Orbán’s younger brother, Aron, 49. The national asset protection and recovery office, known as the NVVH, separately announced that it had worked with police to detain four people and search properties in Budapest and the surrounding county of Pest.
In a statement issued on Monday, authorities said the investigation concerned suspected assistance given to Vietnamese citizens seeking to reach western Europe over several months in 2024. They alleged that visa applicants were charged a recruitment fee at Hungarian foreign missions in Vietnam and that those involved in the scheme divided the money among themselves.
Police said the four people detained, a woman and three men, were suspected of people-smuggling through a criminal conspiracy intended to generate financial gain. The alleged collection and sharing of fees from visa applicants formed part of the authorities’ account of the operation under investigation.
Orbán responded on Facebook by portraying his brother’s detention as political retaliation. He accused his opponents of seeking to eliminate political competition and establish a one-party system. “I am the target, my younger brother is just a tool,” the former prime minister wrote, presenting the action against his sibling as an attempt to attack him.
Magyar defeated Orbán in the April election and established the NVVH to examine allegations of corruption during the former leader’s administration. Orbán has denied those allegations. The office has become a central part of the new government’s anti-graft initiative, which Magyar has named “Operation Purgatory”. In September, it said one of its first four planned investigations would examine the alleged sale of political connections to secure residence permits for employment.
The people-smuggling inquiry comes alongside separate corruption investigations involving senior figures from Orbán’s time in government. Two former ministers and the former central bank governor, György Matolcsy, have been arrested over graft allegations. During his Berlin remarks, Magyar said three former Orbán ministers were already in custody before referring to the detention of the former prime minister’s brother.
