Die Zeit, the German liberal weekly based in Hamburg, set the tone: it published a portrait of the "populist" Orbán well before the first round of elections. Readers of the paper found out that as soon as Orbán heard about the death last year of Count Otto Lambsdorff, the one-time leader of the German liberals, he immediately travelled to the funeral service without having been invited.

"The widow of Count Lambsdorff remembered him well. At one time, her husband had had high hopes for Orbán, who later on caused him serious disappointment", and whose transformation from a promising young liberal into a "right-wing populist" was viewed by the one-time West German economic minister, according to the paper, with growing aversion. The deceased can no longer refute this, but Die Zeit makes it seem as if it had been Lambsdorff that had excluded Fidesz from the Liberal International - which is evidently a misunderstanding, for it was Fidesz - during the previous Orbán-government - that left of its own will, and asked to become a member of the European People's Party.

Although the Fidesz formation changed its name already in 1995, the paper continues to call it the Federation of Young Democrats (Bund Junger Demokraten). What is even more striking than the paper's errors are its unfounded declarations. For example, that Hungary, which was once the happiest barracks, is today the home of "nationalistic myths and right-wing populism that marches to and fro".

According to the article, it is beyond doubt that Orbán is behind these phenomena, for already during his previous term in office, he labelled "foreign capital" as the greatest enemy of our homeland and the family, then he called the "Communist government" (sic!) "Cosmopolitan (idegenszívű)", to which Die Zeit remarked: in other words, this expression means Jewish.

But these are not the only elements that bring to mind former Socialist campaigns - the "crime" of the three-week parliamentary sessions, preventing the establishment of committees of inquiry, and of course the written accusations of the type: "the church, the crown and pathos are at the center of politics", making use of the vocabulary of intellectuals with close ties to the one-time Free Democrats. All this is not surprising, for one of the few people quoted by the article is sociologist Mária Vásárhelyi, who is known in the Hungarian media for her writings about the threat of an anti-Semitic Hungary.

"Fidesz is the most dangerous party", for "it controls the media, incites ethnic tensions, and spreads hate," the German paper quotes Vásárhelyi. The scandalous statements made by Oszkár Molnár, mayor of Edelény, about mothers who intentionally hurt their foetuses in the hope of receiving a higher sum in benefits, also come to light. On top of it all, it states that Orbán "remained silent for weeks" after the statementof the mayor of Edelény became public. This is an exaggeration, to put it mildly, for it took the chairman of Fidesz three days to distance himself from the statements made by a fellow member of his party.

According to the paper, it was Orbán who turned Jobbik into a "comme il faut" party. For years he flirted with the party, and even put up with the presence of flags of the "Hungarian Nazis" at Fidesz party events - the paper is of course alluding to the Árpád house flag.

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Instead of malicious misstatements, Newsweek, the American weekly, chose to move in the direction of groundless lies. The article that appeared in the April 16th edition of the paper, written by Denis MacShane, Great Britain's former Labour under-secretary of state for European Affairs, had phrases such as "In Hungary the Fidesz won big in recent elections with attacks on "Jewish capital...which wants to devour the entire world," as well as nonsense like "the openly anti-Jewish Jobbik Party's representatives want to wear the neo-Nazi uniform of the pre-1939 Hungarian Guard when they take their seats in Budapest's Parliament."

These unfounded statements found fertile ground in the British press, too. Last week, The Times published an article about the advance of the European extreme right, and in it, Viktor Orbán was listed with the Dutch Geert Wilders, who is anti-Muslim, and the French Jean-Marie Le Pen, who dislikes immigrants, then it went on to discuss the success of Jobbik: "They blame the Gypsies for the economic crisis, and have gained seats in the Parliament by doing so." Considering that the article names no other Hungarian politician, to the British reader hungry for information, it may seem that Orbán is the leader of Jobbik.

Gyurcsány has disappeared

Nevertheless, we must present the gold medal of ignorance to the above-mentioned Die Zeit, for in its article, published after the first round of the elections, the paper mentions the former prime minister, Ferenc Gyurcsány, who "had to resign in 2006 for having falsified the figures of public finances". "His acknowledgement of this in public became known in the modern history of Hungary as "the lie-speech."

Even though the quotation has nothing to do with reality, at least Die Zeit mentions Gyurcsány, and that is a feat in itself - the majority of foreign papers write not a single word about him, and the reason is not a lack of space: these are long, analytical writings which dig into the depths, as in the case of Oszkár Molnár.

In Der Spiegel's edition, published betwee the two rounds of the elections, only Gordon Bajnai is mentioned as the person who managed to control state expenditure. Although the Hamburg weekly characterises Fidesz as a right-wing, conservative force and does not use the attribute populist, it does not fail to mention Viktor Orbán's responsibility in allowing Jobbik to become this strong. The paper labels him as a nationalist who - from an ideological point of view - competes with the extreme right, and has called his political opponents enemies of the nation. According to the paper, "the genies he has let out of the lamp will soon be in his wake".

The greatest German daily, the Süddeutsche Zeitung of Munich, went even further, calling Hungary the powder keg of Europe - the left-liberal paper's analysis after the first round of the elections dealt mainly with Jobbik, and although it gave the best interpretation of the Őszöd speech, the paper is of the opinion that the "Trauma of the Trianon Treaty" lies at the centre of Hungarians' worries.

If the German readers were not adequately worried, an interview made with the Hungarian writer György Konrád would no doubt push them in that direction. In Hungary, if a party wants to be successful, it must be dictatorial, like Fidesz; that is how Konrád explained the fall of the Free Democrats, adding: "In Hungary, liberalism is associated with the Communists and the Jews."

The interview that Die Zeit made with the author Péter Nádas was a pleasant surprise: instead of spreading panic concerning the rise of Fascism, the author calls our attention to the causes of these phenomena, to the "defencelessness" of Hungarians, and to the responsibility of Europe.

His throne and crown

Similarly to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the French Libération makes use of Hungarians "at hand" to make their article more authentic, after the second round of the elections. Péter Kende, who lives in Paris, says: the leaders of Fidesz are not anti-Semitic, but they do not distance themselves from the extreme right, and this is what differentiates Orbán and company from the great conservative parties of Europe.

It is true that Márk Szabó, head analyst of Nézőpont Intézet (Perspective Institute) was also interviewed: according to him, Fidesz is the only moderate party that is able to create a concentration of forces, and it was due to the mistakes that the Socialists made while in power, and the corruption which came to light, that made Fidesz' great comeback possible. Péter Hack is also interviewed by the paper. According to the one-time Free Democrat politician, there is only one thing that a democrat can hope for: that Viktor Orbán will be able to help Hungary get back on its feet.

The French conservative paper, Le Figaro, chose to be ironic at the beginning of the week - with a spot of humour befitting the political TV programme, Heti Hetes, according to which the old joke is once again spreading in Budapest: Why did Viktor Orbán have the crown of Saint Stephen taken to Parliament? "So he could try it on in secret, in the evenings".

"From now on, the ambitious Orbán, who for eight years sat impatiently in the opposition, can get back his crown and his throne," wrote the paper. The conservative Austrian paper, Die Presse published a portrait of Orbán, following the second round, entitled: Is he a decisive strategist or an unscrupulous populist? The question remains open. In order for the foreign papers to eventually choose the former, there is a need for not only good governing, but also long consultations with the representatives of the foreign press.