Viktor Orban, the populist prime minister of Hungary issued a personal behind-the-scenes challenge to the French president Emmanuel Macron to contest the ideological future of Europe, The Telegraph can reveal.
European sources said that Mr Orban announced a political tug-of-war on the sidelines of June’s quarterly EU leaders summit, telling Mr Macron that Europe’s destiny would play out between the two of them, “the populist and the European”.
Mr Orban told Mr Macron that there would “only be two winners” from the EU elections next May – himself and the French President – but that he would be “the biggest winner of all”.
The encounter, which is understood to have irritated senior French officials, is typical of Mr Orban’s confrontational style which is seeing him forging nationalist alliances across Europe to in a bid to dethrone the EU’s liberal establishment.
The increasingly raw divisions of European politics were exposed last week when MEPs voted by a margin of 448-197 to demand Hungary face ‘Article 7’ proceedings for the alleged anti-democratic behaviour.
Mr Orban, who is accused of fostering anti-semitism and undermining universities, the free media and Europe’s liberal values, railed against the move in an address to the Parliament accusing it of “blackmailing” his country.
“Hungary will protect its borders, stop illegal migration and… if needed, we will stand up to you,” he threatened, turning the focus back onto the migration issue which has energised nationalist political sentiment all across Europe.
Experts and diplomats saw the encounter as the latest opening skirmishes in a coming fight for the "soul of Europe" in which nationalists like Mr Orban and the Matteo Salvini, the Italian interior minister, will line up against Mr Macron and the forces of liberalism.
Antonio Tajani, the president of the European Parliament, increased the sense of battlelines being drawn by raising the prospect of Article 7 actions against Malta, Romania and Slovakia.
In many respects, battle has already been joined. Last month Mr Orban held a press conference with Mr Salvini, speaking of “two camps” in Europe that were pro- and anti-immigration, in a bid to paint Mr Macron as soft on the issue.
The French president quickly accepted the challenge, acknowledging what he called a “nationalist-progressive” rift in Europe.
“I will not give an inch to nationalists and those who defend hate speech, so if they want to see me as their main opponent they are right to do so.”
A senior French diplomatic source said that Mr Macron – as he had in his battle for the French presidency with Marine Le Penn – would “not shy away from this cleavage in Europe” but confront the nationalist-progressive division head on.
“The same dynamic will apply with the European elections as the French, because when you really ask people what kind of Europe they really want, whether they want the Euro or the EU to fail, the majority clearly say ‘no’. The reaction to Brexit in Europe clearly showed that.”
The contest will play out most most directly in the European parliamentary elections next May which, after years of declining turnout, look set to recapture public interest.
“The federalist-nationalist faultline in EU politics is now well exposed, and the election campaign should be meaningful,” said Andrew Duff, the chair of the federalist Spinelli group. “The citizens could begin to take notice.”
Polling experts say there is now the potential for a re-ordering of Europe’s main political alliances, as the current grand coalition between the Centre-right EPP group and the Socialists splinters, potentially opening a route for Mr Macron to fill the middle.
Research by Hanbury Strategy, the political analytics firm, predicts that on current polling Socialists will suffer major losses, shrinking from its current 190 seats to 110-130, with the EPP also getting shaved down, from it’s current 217 seats to 180-190.
Mr Macron’s "En Marche" political party is now actively exploring coalition options with the liberal ALDE grouping run by Guy Verhofstadt, a committed EU federalist and implacable opponent of Mr Orban.
If the predicted results do make coalition-building much more difficult, then En March-ALDE would be the only party with coalition options in the centre, on the right and on the left, according to the Hanbury Strategy calculations.
Mr Verhofsttadt is eager to join battle and said he would provide a European alternative to “the nationalists and populists inside and outside this house”.
“The inconvenient truth is that the alt-Right in Europe is trying to undermine the European Union and is in fact trying to take over the European politics from within,” he said in the European Parliament in Strasbourg last week.
The decision to demand censure of Mr Orban has also split the EPP, the main centre-right political grouping that also includes Angela Merkel’s CDU party and, until last week, had been accused of ‘shielding’ the Hungarian leader from Article 7 proceedings.