and financial institutions

4.2. Hate speech on social media

Hate speech continues to be a mainstay of the political discourse on social media platforms as well, which targets the individuals on the basis of ethnicity and nationality. The Hungarian minority is still one of the biggest targets of the hateful messages posted on different social media platforms, not only by private citizens, but also by mainstream politicians. Due to the fact that the content of the communicated text is rarely checked and regulated, social media has become a breeding ground for xenophobic rhetoric. Incitement to hatred, xenophobic and anti-Hungarian manifestations are still widely present in the Romanian society, which is proven by last year’s happennings as well.

On the 15th of March, 2021, George Simion, co-chair of the Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR) posted a video message, taken in the center of Sfântu Gheorghe/Sepsiszentgyörgy, in which he criticized the decoration exhibited on the occasion of the 15th of March celebrations, the National Day of Hungarians. The aim of this message was to incite to hatred against the Hungarian community and transmit racist ideas.

On the National Day of Hungarians, George Simion incited against the Hungarians in Sfântu Gheorghe/ Sepsiszentgyörgy and encouraged the Romanians to take violent actions against the Hungarian symbols, suggesting that it would be right to remove them through vandalism

His video message reads as follows:

„We are in Sfântu Gheorghe and as always, as every year, there is a challenge and a great lack of respect for Romania, here in the center of the country, the whole square of Sfântu Gheorghe is full of flags in the colors of Hungary, without at least one Romanian flag...What the City Hall does here in Sfântu Gheorghe, what UDMR/RMDSZ does here, the constant challenges and lack of respect for the Romanian nation, cannot be tolerated. UMDR is a terrorist, which created ethnic tensions...There was an agreement that there would be no activity in the Parliament on Monday..because it is the 15th of March, the National Day of Hungarians. (....) It is outrageous! In the center of Romania, in the center of the country you cannot display the flags of other countries without displaying the flag of our country...Such challenges, like these invented flags of the so-called regions, which actually do not exist, must be stopped!...Transylvania belonged, belongs and will belong to Romania...we should not have invented flags and Hungarian flags in the center of the country...I don’t think that we should have parties based on ethnic criteria in Romania..”

He also posted the following message accompanying the above photo:

„Such a thing is inadmissible: the center of the country, Sfântu Gheorghe, full of flags in the colors of Hungary! As a Member of Parliament, I am asking the Romanian state institutions to intervene urgently to legalize the situation in the center of Sfântu Gheorghe. I will also initiate a law to toughen up penalties. But we have no allies in the parliament for this issue: Do you support us?”

By sharing this message Simion sought to deepen the already existing ethnic conflict between the majority and the minority population. Such discriminatory messages distributed on social media platforms aim to incite to hatred against the Hungarian minority.

A Hungarian politician was threatened with rape on social media after a political declaration. Threatening someone with sexual violence on social media is an organic part of the anti-Hungarian extremists’ rhetoric

Following this post, many antiHungarian comments were added by different individuals. The behaviour of the co-chair of the Alliance for the Unity of Romanians in this regard, manifested on his social media page, can only be described as one whose immediate purpose was to create tension between the Romanian and the Hungarian groups, by coming to a city, where actually the people belonging to the two ethnicities live peacefully.

In a democratic state, where fundamental rights and freedoms, the right to identity and other such rights are guaranteed by law, it is unacceptable for a Member of the Romanian Parliament to resort to political means that are likely to divide the society. We firmly condemn such malicious statements, such instigatory rhetoric, which stigmatized an entire community.

Such anti-Hungarian messages were posted by other politicians as well, such as the leader of the Calea Neamului Association,