Chinese university plan causes security concerns in Hungary

Hungary's government plans to host a Chinese university campus in its capital Budapest

BUDAPEST, Hungary -- Piles of garbage, discarded debris and abandoned buildings are scattered across a post-industrial area on the left bank of the Danube River, just south of the grandiose downtown of Hungary's capital, Budapest. The area has been unused for decades, languishing in post-socialist decay in the 30 years since anti-communist firebrands pressed for the end of Soviet domination in Hungary at the end of the 1980s. But it's here that one of those early reformers, Hungary's right-wing nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orban, envisions building a gigantic university that has pledged its allegiance to the Chinese Communist Party. This week, Hungary signed a strategic agreement with the Shanghai-based Fudan University on opening a campus in Budapest by 2024. It would be the school's only foreign outpost, and the first Chinese university campus in the 27-nation European Union.