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INTERNATIONAL EDITION | THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 2018
CHINA RULESTHE ROAD TOCONFRONTATIONPAGE 4 | WORLD
‘NETWORK’STILL RELEVANT,AND MAD AS EVERPAGE 14 | CULTURE
52 PLACES TRAVELERTESTING HER METTLEIN A PACIFIC PARADISEBACK PAGE | TRAVEL
scandals, mysteries surround the social-ist mayor of Szeged.”
Little known outside Hungary, Origois a cautionary tale for an age in whichdemocratic norms and freedom of ex-pression are being challenged globallyand President Trump and other leadershave intensified attacks on the freepress.
In many ways, Hungary foreshad-owed the democratic backsliding nowevident in different corners of the world.Since winning power in 2010, Mr. Orbanhas steadily eroded institutional checksand balances, especially the independ-ent media. His government overseesstate-owned news outlets, while his al-lies control most of the country’s privatemedia sources, creating a virtual echochamber for Mr. Orban’s far-right, anti-immigrant views.
The story of Origo’s transformationfrom independent news source to gov-ernment cheerleader offers a blueprintof how Mr. Orban and his allies pulledthis off. Rather than a sudden and bla-tant power grab, the effort was subtlebut determined, using a quiet pressurecampaign.
Origo’s editors were never impris-oned and its reporters were never beat-en up. But in secret meetings — includ-ing a pivotal one in Vienna — the web-site’s original owner, a German-ownedtelecommunications company, relented.
Hungary’s leading news website, Origo,had a juicy scoop: A top aide to the far-right prime minister, Viktor Orban, hadused state money to pay for sizable butunexplained expenses during secret for-eign trips. The story embarrassed Mr.Orban and was a reminder that his coun-try still had an independent press.
But that was in 2014. Today, Origo isone of the prime minister’s most dutifulmedia boosters, parroting his attacks onmigrants and on George Soros, the Hun-garian-American philanthropist demon-ized by the far right on both sides of theAtlantic.
And if Origo once dug into Mr. Orban’sgovernment, it now pounces on his poli-tical opponents.
“Let’s look at the affairs of LaszloBotka!” a headline blared this month ina salacious take on the only mayor of amajor Hungarian city not aligned withMr. Orban’s party, Fidesz. “Serious
The company, Magyar Telekom, firsttried self-censorship. Then it sought anonpartisan buyer.
But, ultimately, Origo went to the fam-ily of Mr. Orban’s former finance min-ister.
“When Orban came to power in 2010,his aim was to eliminate the media’s roleas a check on government,” said Attila
Mong, a former public radio anchor anda critic of Mr. Orban. “Orban wanted tointroduce a regime which keeps the fa-cade of democratic institutions but is notoperated in a democratic manner — anda free press doesn’t fit into that picture.”
On the surface, Hungary’s democraticinstitutions seem to be operating nor-HUNGARY, PAGE 8
Since the beginning of his premiership in 2010, Viktor Orban has steadily eroded the checks and balances in Hungary, especially the independent news media.AKOS STILLER/BLOOMBERG NEWS
How a free press can dieBUDAPEST
Hungarian website bowedto pressure from nation’sleader and his allies
BY PATRICK KINGSLEYAND BENJAMIN NOVAK
A protest against Mr. Orban’s news media policies in Budapest. Freedom House’s pressfreedom index now labels the Hungarian news media as only “partly free.”
ZSOLT SZIGETVARY/MTI, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
When the members of Bottlesmoker, an“indietronic” band from Indonesia,landed in Vietnam last Thursday, theywere looking forward to their set atQuest Festival, an annual event billed asa “wondrous, wild wonderland of na-ture, art and eclectic entertainment.”
But just after 11 p.m. on Friday — afterbands and fans had traveled to the festi-val site near the capital, Hanoi — theQuest organizers told Bottlesmoker byemail that the event was off. “After sup-porting us until today the authoritieshave decided to withdraw our festival li-
cense for reasons that are still unknownto us,” they wrote.
“Bottlesmoker was waiting to play atQuest Festival for, like, almost twoyears,” Anggung Suherman, who playssynthesizers in the band, said. “So it’sreally broken our hearts.”
Asia is a growing market for Western-inspired music festivals where elec-tronic beats blare into the wee hours, àla Coachella in California or Glaston-bury in England.
In China alone, the number of elec-tronic dance music festivals was ex-pected to rise to more than 150 this yearfrom 32 in 2016, according to a recentsurvey of the electronic music industryby Kevin Watson, a London-based ana-lyst.
But on top of the logistical challengesthat accompany music festivals in anycountry, promoters across much of Asiaface an additional headache: conserva-tive governments that see the events as FESTIVALS, PAGE 2
Festivals where bandsdo not get to play onHONG KONG
As Western-style eventsgrow across Asia, officialsmove to stop the music
BY MIKE IVES
The New York Times publishes opinionfrom a wide range of perspectives inhopes of promoting constructive debateabout consequential questions.
President Trump is projecting a steelyfacade as he prepares for a critical meet-ing on trade this weekend with Presi-dent Xi Jinping of China. But behind histough talk and threats of higher tariffs isa creeping anxiety about the costs of aprolonged trade war on the financialmarkets and the broader economy.
That could set the stage for a truce be-tween the United States and China, sev-eral American officials said, in the formof an agreement that would delay newtariffs for several months while theworld’s two largest economies try towork out the issues dividing them.
Such an outcome is not certain. Ad-ministration officials have expresseddeep disappointment with China’s re-sponse to Mr. Trump’s pressure so far,characterizing it as a list of proposals,transmitted in Chinese, that they saywould do little to curb China’s theft ofAmerican technology or address itsother predatory trade practices.
But Mr. Trump has signaled a newwillingness to make a deal with Mr. Xi, aleader he has treated solicitously andwill meet with over dinner on Saturdayin Buenos Aires, after a summit meetingof leaders of the Group of 20 industri-alized nations.
The gyrations in the United Statesstock market, the rise in interest ratesand thousands of layoffs announced byGeneral Motors this week have all rat-tled Mr. Trump, officials said, fueling hisdesire to emerge from his meal with Mr.Xi with something he can claim as a vic-tory.
“There’s a good possibility that wecan make a deal, and he is open to it,” Mr.Trump’s chief economic adviser, LarryKudlow, said Tuesday. But if the meetingfails to produce a breakthrough, he said,Mr. Trump will be “perfectly happy tostand on his tariff policies.”
At the moment, the administrationplans to raise existing tariffs on $250 bil-lion worth of Chinese goods, to 25 per-cent from 10 percent, on Jan. 1. Mr.Trump has also threatened to imposetariffs on an additional $267 billion ofChinese goods — a step many fearwould plunge the two giants into a full-fledged economic Cold War.
If the two leaders agree to talks, how-ever, officials said Mr. Trump wouldmost likely postpone the increase to 25percent and hold off on any new tariffs.That would be similar to a deal he strucklast July with the European Union, inwhich he agreed to delay auto tariffs inreturn for a pledge by Europe to buy TRADE, PAGE 8
U.S. signalswillingnessfor a truce with BeijingWASHINGTON
Economic tremors are said to strengthen Trump’s hopeto reach a trade agreement
BY MARK LANDLER,GLENN THRUSHAND KEITH BRADSHER
Democratic countries that worry aboutthe Chinese government’s attempts toinfluence their politics should study itssuccess in last weekend’s elections inTaiwan.
The many races — for some 11,000positions in villages, towns and coun-ties across the island — were some-thing like midterms and widely seen asa prelude to the next presidentialelection, scheduled for early 2020. Bymy count, candidates friendly to Bei-jing will now occupy 16 of the 24 topposts that were contested, up from thecurrent six.
China has denied any meddling. Butin the last several years, it has intensi-fied its efforts to destabilize the Tai-wanese government led by the pro-independence Democratic Progressive
Party (D.P.P.). Ithas curbed tourismfrom the mainland,conducted militarymaneuvers aroundTaiwan and eventhreatened to in-vade.
How quickly thetide seems to haveturned. In 2016, theD.P.P. had sweptinto power promis-
ing to set stronger safeguards againstencroachment by the Chinese govern-ment even as it would develop Tai-wan’s economic relations with China toimprove its performance. The partywon both the presidency and a solidmajority in the national legislature —advances that seemed likely to radi-cally set back China’s growing ambi-tions on the island.
That D.P.P. victory followed theastounding Sunflower Movement of2014, in which students, mostly, occu-pied the legislature to block the ratifi-cation of a trade treaty with China. Thedeal, negotiated by the administrationof President Ma Ying-jeou, of theKuomintang (KMT), Taiwan’s mainpro-unification party, would have al-lowed Chinese capital easy entry intoTaiwan’s service sector, and the pro-testers feared that it endangered whatlittle remained of Taiwan’s economicindependence. Their sit-in succeededand the treaty was derailed.
But China wouldn’t take no for ananswer. And apparently it was correctnot to: On Saturday night, even beforeall the election results were in, Presi-dent Tsai Ing-wen resigned as the headof the D.P.P.
In part, her party’s losses were theresult of her courageous efforts to
Will Taiwanbe the first to fall to China?Yi-Zheng LianContributing Writer
OPINION
Beijing keepsmakinginroads abroadby exploitingthe mainweakness ofopen societies:openness itself.
LIAN, PAGE 11
Tight spaces Bears near Baile Tusnad, Romania. With their habitat shrinking,the bears have turned to scavenging, causing encounters with humans. PAGE 3
AKOS STILLER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
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