A/HRC/58/49/Add.1 7. Hungary’s population reportedly consists of roughly 84.3% Hungarian (‘Magyar’), 2.1% Roma, 1% German, 1.2% ‘other’, and 13.7% “unspecified”. 2 However, many assert that up to 10% of Hungary’s population are Roma. The government has officially designated a number of minority groups, including the Roma, as ‘national minorities.’ 8. Regarding religious affiliation in the 2022 national census, the largest groups were: 40% who ticked “I do not wish to answer this question”, 28% indicated that they were Roman Catholics and 16% ticked “I do not belong to any religion or denomination”. The main religious groups in Hungary include the Roman Catholic Church, Reformed Church of Hungary (Calvinist), Evangelical Lutheran Church, Greek Catholic Church, and the Jewish population. Other groups include the Greek Orthodox Church, Faith Congregation (a Pentecostal group), Hungarian Evangelical Fellowship (MET/ Hungarian Evangelical Brotherhood), Russian and other Orthodox Christian groups, other Christian denominations, Baháʼís, Buddhists, the Hungarian Society for Krishna Consciousness, Muslims and the Church of Scientology. 9. Hungary’s history was regularly raised by interlocutors - government authorities, religion or belief communities, or others from civil society - before discussing the current day. They highlighted the Communist era’s (1949-1989) severe restrictions on freedom of religion or belief, ban on religious education, purging of Catholic and Protestant Churches; and they related current state-religion relations as a response to that. After a long history of varying authoritarian regimes, Hungary’s modern constitutional parliamentary democracy was introduced in 1989, with democratic institutions set up and developed over the first 20 years. 10. Hungary was the first in the region to rewrite its constitution to embrace democratic values. Free and fair elections followed from 1990 through 2010 with regular alternation of governments between left and right. Hungary experienced the largest inward flow of foreign direct investment in post-communist Europe and one of the least chaotic economic transitions. International NGOs put their East-Central European headquarters in Budapest, widely regarded as the most stable and sympathetic regional home. Hungary’s 2003 referendum on joining the European Union (EU) received 84% for the “yes” camp. It entered the EU in 2004 after it sailed through external assessments recognising its democracy, respect of the rule of law, human rights protection, and stable market economy. 11. In recent years, Hungary has been governed by the Alliance of Young Democrats (Fidesz), led by Viktor Orbán, by far Hungary’s largest party. Fidesz and coalition partners, including the KDNP/‘Christian Democratic People’s Party’ have secured a supermajority in the Hungarian parliament in every election since 2010 (2014, 2018, 2022). The government used its supermajority to pass a new constitution in 2011, amending it several times since. According to human rights practitioners and analysis, this concentration of power has had a negative effect on democracy and human rights, as the country has undergone an authoritarian, nationalistic turn. III. International legal framework 12. Hungary ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) in 1974 and is party to various international and regional human rights treaties, including the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Hungary joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in 1999 and the EU in 2004, hence bound by the Treaty on the European Union and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. However, the relationship with both has been tense since 2010. 13. The right to freedom of religion or belief is protected by articles 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and of the ICCPR, article 9 of the ECHR, and article 10 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights. 14. Hungary reports regularly to human rights mechanisms. Concerns raised by human rights treaty body concluding observations (2018-2023) included xenophobia and 2 https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/hungary/. 3