Part I — Situation overview

The dismissal of 25 ambassadors appeared in the Hungarian Official Gazette on Friday evening, 31 July 2026. The list of the posts concerned spans the full range of weight of Hungarian external relations: Washington, Moscow, Brussels (bilateral representation), London, Prague, Bratislava, Belgrade, Kyiv, Sarajevo, Yerevan, Tbilisi, Doha, Baghdad, Algiers, Singapore, Manila, Wellington, Bogotá, Pretoria, The Hague, Copenhagen, Oslo, together with the leadership of the OSCE and UN representations in Vienna and of the UN and WTO representations in Geneva; the OSCE is the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and the WTO is the World Trade Organization. The dismissal decisions were signed by President of the Republic Tamás Sulyok, countersigned by Foreign Minister Anita Orbán, and each contains the formula “with recognition of their merits”. According to press reports no successor has so far been appointed to a single post. The present step is the legal implementation of a process announced in June: at the end of June the foreign minister reported the recall of 37 heads of mission, with the justification that the aim is to build “a professional diplomatic service operating at a high professional standard”, and that part of the changes relate to expiring mandates.

The bulk of those returning home are career diplomats unknown to the wider public — but the list also includes several politically appointed heads of mission, among them General Ferenc Korom, former commander of the Hungarian Defence Forces (Doha), Gábor Tamás Nagy, a former member of parliament and district mayor (Wellington), and Zsófia Vitézy (Bogotá), who is a cousin of the previous prime minister. Two further personnel items arrived on the same day. Gladden J. Pappin, head of the Hungarian Institute of Foreign Affairs, resigned; the institute — which in the previous government cycle came under the direction of the Prime Minister’s Office — returned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after the change of government, and according to the minister its primary task is now to support foreign-policy decision-making with research, analyses and forecasts. Information about the successor was promised for Monday. In addition, Tamás Széles, hitherto deputy EU negotiator, was appointed prime ministerial commissioner for European Union affairs, directly under the direction of the head of government.

MIAK’s reading: the replacement of the head-of-mission corps after a change of government is a legitimate and politically expected step — initiating the filling of posts of trust is within the powers of the government of the day, and part of the appointments on the present list themselves followed a political logic. The policy question is not whether replacement may take place, but what institutional cost the concentration and pace of the replacement carries. Twenty-five posts falling vacant at the same time, with no appointed successors, means that the knowledge about matters under way, about the commitments entered into and about the local network of contacts leaves the system at a single point in time, in concentrated form — while EU funding negotiations and the international coordination of an energy crisis are taking place precisely now. This loss follows not from the nature of the decision but from the planning of its implementation, and it is precisely for that reason that it can be influenced.

Part II — Literature foundation

To interpret the topic it is worth fixing two mutually tense propositions of diplomatic theory. The volume Diplomatic Theory from Machiavelli to Kissinger by the British diplomatic historian G. R. Berridge and co-authors, following the seventeenth-century Dutch author Abraham de Wicquefort, identifies the essence of the resident, that is permanent, mission in the fact that through it states are able to maintain the “continuity of settled expectations” — that is, the value of an embassy depends not on a single negotiation but on accumulated, continuous knowledge. The same volume also reports the counter-argument of the Florentine statesman Francesco Guicciardini: an envoy serving long in one place tends to over-weight the considerations of the receiving party, because those are what they see at close quarters — this phenomenon is “localitis”. The two propositions together give the policy meaning of rotation: replacement is necessary, but the replacement must take place while preserving continuity. The textbook Foreign Policy and Diplomacy by the Romanian authors Naumescu and Petruț places this in the frame of the professionalisation of the modern diplomatic service, while the memoir From Third World to First by Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew adds the practical yardstick for selection to key positions. The detailed treatment of the literature — author by author, with quotations — can be found in the 6.4 Literature in detail section.

Part III — MIAK’s concrete proposal

MIAK proposes three measurable measures, none of which questions the government’s power to propose head-of-mission appointments.

3.1 A mandatory handover protocol at every mission (by the date of departure)

The most urgent and the cheapest step. MIAK proposes that every dismissed head of mission should, before leaving the post, prepare a standardised handover protocol recording: the negotiations under way and their state; the commitments made by the Hungarian side and their deadlines; pending consular and economic matters; the list of institutional contact persons in the receiving country by position (not as a personal acquaintance but as an institutional relationship); and the key events expected at the mission concerned over the next 12 months. Where no successor has yet been appointed, the addressee of the protocol is the chargé d’affaires ad interim and the competent regional department of the ministry. This measure requires no amendment of legislation, can be ordered by ministerial instruction, and prevents precisely the loss that Berridge describes as the loss of continuity (see 6.4.1). The proposal is linked to the KP5 diplomatic capacity development programme point.

3.2 A public head-of-mission competence profile and the publication of the justification of the appointment (within 60 days)

MIAK asks the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to publish what competences it expects of a head of mission — broken down by category of post (EU institutional representation, large bilateral partner, regional neighbourhood, economically focused post, multilateral representation). The profile should contain the required language skills, the sectoral knowledge and the managerial experience. Thereafter, simultaneously with every new appointment, the appointee’s professional CV and a short justification referring to the profile should be published. Importantly: MIAK does not propose prohibiting political appointment — the institution of the post of trust is legitimate and exists in every diplomatic system. What it does propose is that the ministry should publish the ratio of political to career appointments and undertake an upper limit on it. This yardstick is independent of political side: the same criticism applies to a government that appoints on the basis of kinship or party loyalty as to one that does the same with the opposite political sign. The proposal builds on the KP3 transparent foreign policy and the KI7 official-selection programme points.

3.3 An open competition for the head of the Institute of Foreign Affairs and the publication of the foreign-policy doctrine (within 90 days)

The post of head of the Hungarian Institute of Foreign Affairs is now vacant, and the organisation’s place in the direction structure has also changed: it has moved from under the Prime Minister’s Office to under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. According to MIAK this is the moment when situation-analysis capacity can be institutionalised instead of restarting from zero in every government cycle. Two steps are needed for this. One: the selection of the head of the institute should take place by public competition based on a professional set of criteria, with a defined term of office that does not coincide with the government cycle. The other: within 90 days the Ministry of Foreign Affairs should publish a short foreign-policy doctrine document recording what principles guide bilateral decisions, multilateral commitments and crisis management. The practical benefit of this is that the head-of-mission competence profile can also be measured against it, and that the task-setting of the analytical institute depends not on the daily politics of the day but on a public frame. The proposal touches the KP12 documentation of foreign-policy philosophy and the KP13 geopolitical situation-analysis capacity programme points.

The three proposals are bound together by a single principle: diplomatic performance is not a matter of person-dependent loyalty but of institutionalised expertise. Initiating a change of personnel is the government’s right; the accumulated knowledge, however, belongs to the state, and its preservation depends not on the goodwill of the departing official but on whether a procedure exists for it.

Part IV — Expected effects and risks

Dimension Expected effect Risk
External relations The handover protocol reduces the interruption of negotiating continuity; it makes Hungarian positions more predictable for partners The protocol may become formal if there is no accountability behind it; genuinely valuable relational knowledge is hard to formalise
Public administration The public competence profile gives a yardstick for the appointment and makes the decision verifiable after the fact The profile may become rigid and exclude atypical but suitable candidates whom a good system would let in
Transparency Publishing the political/career ratio turns a question hitherto disputed by estimate into data The borderline cases of classification are debatable; the definition must therefore be fixed in advance, not after the fact

The main trade-off stretches between political direction and professional continuity. The government has a constitutional right to shape its foreign policy according to its own priorities, and for this it needs heads of mission who represent these credibly — this consideration was formulated by the foreign minister as well. This is legitimate. The risk arises if the yardstick of loyalty crowds out the professional one: Guicciardini’s observation does justify rotation, but it does not justify discarding accumulated knowledge. The proposals work if the competence profile really is a filter and not an after-the-fact justification; if the justification is only written after the appointment, the system becomes formal.

The second trade-off lies in the timing. Twenty-five posts falling vacant simultaneously and the postponement of the appointment of successors are two separate decisions which together carry a much greater risk than each does separately. If the appointments take place within a few weeks, the continuity loss is manageable; if chargés d’affaires ad interim head the key missions for months in the middle of an EU funding negotiation cycle, the cost rises substantially. This is why MIAK proposes that the appointment schedule — by post, with deadlines — should itself be public.

Part V — Measurability and summary

5.1 What is worth tracking? (proposed performance indicators)

According to MIAK the following performance indicators (KPIs, in English Key Performance Indicator) are worth tracking:

  • The number of days elapsed until the appointment of a successor at the key missions (Washington, Brussels, Moscow, London, Kyiv, Belgrade) — proposed target that at the strategic posts this figure should not exceed 60 days, and that the ministry should publish an appointment schedule.
  • The proportion of published professional CVs among new head-of-mission appointments — proposed target full coverage, with publication simultaneous with the appointment.
  • The ratio of political to career appointments in the head-of-mission corps, published annually, with a classification definition fixed in advance — the yardstick is not a specific figure but that the indicator should exist at all and be comparable.
  • The completion rate of handover protocols in the case of the present 25 dismissals — proposed target that after 30 days one should be available for every mission.

5.2 Summary

The key message: MIAK does not dispute the dismissal of the 25 ambassadors — initiating this is within the powers of the government of the day, and it is a customary step after a change of government. It asks that the manner of implementation should preserve what belongs to the state and not to the government: the accumulated diplomatic knowledge. Concretely three things: a mandatory handover protocol at every mission by the date of departure; a public head-of-mission competence profile and the publication of the justification of the appointment within 60 days; and an open competition for the head of the Institute of Foreign Affairs together with the publication of a foreign-policy doctrine document within 90 days. None of these restricts the government’s room for manoeuvre in whom it proposes for appointment — all three are about making the decision knowable after the fact and the knowledge transferable.

Two MIAK foundational values are in play in this matter. Transparency, because the appointment of ambassadors is today one of the least documented kinds of state personnel decision: the dismissals appear in the official gazette, but neither the justification of the dismissal nor that of the appointment is public, so the reader has no instrument for deciding whether they are seeing professional renewal or a simple exchange of loyalties. And accountability, because the deterioration of diplomatic capacity is a slow and long-invisible process: by the time the consequence — a lost negotiating position, a missed commitment — appears, the decision can no longer be tied to anyone. The handover protocol and the appointment schedule create precisely this trail. MIAK would have asked the same yardstick of the previous government, and will ask the same of the next.

Part VI — Justifications and further sources

6.1 The press framing by spectrum

The liberal-left band put the emphasis on the persons dismissed and on the political reading of the list. Telex broke the list down according to a geographical-political logic (“posts that can be seen as a reward” — Oslo, The Hague, New Zealand, Colombia — as against the heads of mission serving in the Russian sphere of influence and in Western capitals), and presented the politically appointed diplomats by name. HVG added the public-law detail to this — that the dismissals were signed by the President of the Republic with the countersignature of the foreign minister, and that each contains the formula “with recognition of their merits” — and highlighted that the bulk of those returning home are career diplomats unknown to the wider public. This band therefore framed the circle of persons and the political symbolism.

The public-affairs and economic band highlighted the institutional side of the news. 24.hu put the procedural fact in its headline (the foreign minister initiated the termination of the mandates) and listed the weightiest posts — Washington, Brussels, Moscow — first, together with the minister’s justification invoking professional renewal. Portfolio inserted the wholesale ambassadorial replacement into a broader stream of government news, in the same summary as the Paks shutdown — that is, suggesting the simultaneous load on government capacity, which from the point of view of today’s analysis was the most accurate framing.

The conservative band emphasised the protracted nature of the process and the earlier precedents. Magyar Nemzet recalled, as context for the news, the earlier removal of the ambassador in Paris, and separately highlighted that according to the prime minister’s June statement EU ambassador Bálint Ódor remains in his post — that is, it drew attention to the selectivity of the replacement. Mandiner carried the departure of the head of the Institute of Foreign Affairs as a separate item. It is noteworthy that no band of the spectrum placed at the centre of its framing the fact that is the most important from the point of view of the policy risk: that no successor has been appointed to a single post. In HVG’s article this appeared as a single sentence, at subheading level, without analysis.

6.2 Facts and data

Data Value Source
The number of ambassadors dismissed 25 Hungarian Official Gazette, 31 July 2026
The number of recalls announced in June 37 heads of mission statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, end of June 2026
The number of successors appointed to the 25 posts 0 (at the time of the reports) HVG, 31 July 2026
The signatory of the dismissal decision the President of the Republic, with the countersignature of the foreign minister HVG, 31 July 2026
The EU/multilateral representations affected Brussels (bilateral), OSCE and UN in Vienna, UN and WTO in Geneva Telex, HVG, 31 July 2026
The place of the Institute of Foreign Affairs in the direction structure Prime Minister’s Office → Ministry of Foreign Affairs (after the change of government) Telex, HVG, 31 July 2026
The promised date of information about the institute’s new head Monday (3 August 2026) Telex, 31 July 2026

Public-law clarification. Under the Fundamental Law of Hungary the accreditation and dismissal of ambassadors is an act falling within the competence of the President of the Republic and subject to countersignature; the head of the foreign affairs portfolio acts in a preparatory, initiating and countersigning role. The phrase frequent in the press, “the foreign minister recalled the ambassador”, is therefore inaccurate: the initiative does indeed come from the minister, but the dismissal is an act of the head of state. This is not a formality — it is precisely this structure that means the dismissals appear in the official gazette and are thus public at all.

6.3 Policy dimensions

  • Foreign policy (programme points) — the professionalisation of the diplomatic network, the public justification of decisions and the institutionalisation of analytical capacity (programme point ID: KP5, KP3, KP12, KP13);
  • Public administration and e-government (programme points) — the separation of the political and the professional layer in the selection system (programme point ID: KI7);
  • Transparency and anti-corruption policy (background material) — the documentation of personnel decisions and their verifiability after the fact.

6.4 Literature in detail

6.4.1 Berridge: Diplomatic Theory from Machiavelli to Kissinger

In the chapter dealing with the work of the seventeenth-century Dutch diplomat and author Abraham de Wicquefort, the volume shows how the permanent, resident embassy became a basic institution of international relations. The decisive argument in Wicquefort is not legal but practical: states are compelled to live side by side, and for this they need continuous, reliable contact.

“Where numbers of states exist they are condemned to live cheek by jowl, and sooner or later find means by which they can share the advantages of continuity of settled expectations.”

At the same time the volume also reports the counter-argument: Guicciardini is among the earliest to describe the phenomenon whereby an envoy tends to take the side of the prince at whose court they serve — not necessarily because of bribery, but because they see that prince’s affairs continuously and at close quarters, and those affairs therefore acquire greater significance in their eyes than they actually possess. In the case of the Hungarian head-of-mission replacement the two propositions must be read together: the value of continuity argues against rotation, the risk of local bias for it — and it is precisely for that reason that the policy question is not the fact of the replacement but its manner. The handover protocol is the technique that satisfies both considerations.

📖 Source: G. R. Berridge and co-authors: Diplomatic Theory from Machiavelli to Kissinger

6.4.2 Naumescu and Petruț: Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

The textbook by the Romanian authors discusses the institutional development of modern diplomacy, and separately highlights that one defining feature of the so-called French diplomatic system is the professionalisation of the occupation — including recruitment, training, ranks, advancement, remuneration and retirement as a unified system. The authors also record that after the First World War foreign policy ceased to be the exclusive business of career diplomats and became the subject of democratic publicity.

“Foreign policy and diplomacy were not any longer the exclusive matters of career diplomats but more of a public and democratic interest.”

These two observations together give the basis in principle of MIAK’s proposal 3.2. If foreign policy is a public matter, then the justification of a head-of-mission appointment must also be public; if, on the other hand, diplomacy is a professionalised occupation, then the expected competences can be defined and measured in advance. In the Hungarian situation, where the present dismissals appeared in the official gazette but their justification did not, half of the publicity is met: we see the fact, but we do not see the yardstick.

📖 Source: Naumescu and Petruț: Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

6.4.3 Lee Kuan Yew: From Third World to First

The memoir of Singapore’s founding prime minister records the state-building experience of a small, resource-poor country, and speaks with unusual candour about the filling of key positions. According to Lee the filling of the most important constitutional positions is of critical significance, because a bad choice projects its consequences years ahead — and he draws particular attention to the fact that ability is easier to assess than character.

“It is easier to decide who is the ablest than to predict who has the character to measure up to the job.”

In the same volume Lee shows, through the example of the Indian civil service, what happens if the entry yardstick softens: selection loosening under populist pressure damages not only the standard but also communication within the service. In the case of the Hungarian head-of-mission corps this is the practical reason for MIAK’s proposal: the public competence profile is not a bureaucratic formality but the yardstick in whose absence selection slides slowly and imperceptibly towards loyalty — irrespective of which government is doing it.

📖 Source: Lee Kuan Yew: From Third World to First — The Singapore Story 1965–2000

6.5 International comparison

In the United States the proportion of politically appointed ambassadors is traditionally high — typically about a third of the posts — but the system contains two counterweights: the Senate hearing, which is public and on the record, and the annually published statement by the professional foreign service’s representative body on the ratio of political to career appointments. In the Hungarian system no such public ratio exists today — which is why MIAK proposes its publication.

The practice of the European External Action Service (EEAS) is instructive from the rotation side: the mandate of a head of delegation is typically four years, with the possibility of extension, and the post can be filled by competition, with a task profile published in advance. This protects precisely against the local bias described by Guicciardini, without causing the continuity loss that arises from simultaneous, mass replacement — because the rotation is staggered.

In Germany and France, too, a head-of-mission replacement takes place after a change of government, but the practice differs in two elements from the present Hungarian picture: the successor is usually appointed simultaneously with the dismissal or within a few weeks, and the foreign affairs portfolio publishes a strategic document against which the appointment decisions can be measured. Both are exactly what MIAK’s proposals 3.2 and 3.3 ask for.

Foreign policy

  • KP5 — Diplomatic capacity development
  • KP3 — Transparent foreign policy
  • KP12 — Documentation of foreign-policy philosophy
  • KP13 — Geopolitical situation-analysis capacity

Public administration and e-government

  • KI7 — Official selection and rotation system

Proposed new programme point: A mandatory handover protocol on changes of leadership positions in state administration — for the Public administration and e-government area.

6.7 List of sources

Press sources (MIAK press monitor, 1 August 2026 — topic 2):

Knowledge-base references (books):

  • 📖 G. R. Berridge and co-authors: Diplomatic Theory from Machiavelli to Kissinger
  • 📖 Naumescu and Petruț: Foreign Policy and Diplomacy
  • 📖 Lee Kuan Yew: From Third World to First — The Singapore Story 1965–2000

Note: the local file path of the book does NOT appear in the visible text of the blog — only the author and the title. The file path is an internal matter of the generation process, not the reader’s.

MIAK internal materials:

  • MIAK policy area: Foreign policy (programme points; programme point ID: KP5, KP3, KP12, KP13)
  • MIAK policy area: Public administration and e-government (programme points; programme point ID: KI7)
  • MIAK policy area: Transparency and anti-corruption policy (background material)
  • MIAK press monitor, 1 August 2026 — topic 2, score: 87/100

Additional public data sources:

  • Hungarian Official Gazette — dismissal and accreditation decisions
  • Fundamental Law of Hungary — the order of acts of the head of state and of countersignature
  • OECD Public Governance recommendations on the boundary between the political and the professional layer

Generation metadata