BUDAPEST: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban called Tuesday for a debate on reintroducing the death penalty in the EU member state, saying existing penalties were too soft.
"The death penalty question should be put on the agenda in Hungary," Orban told reporters in the southern city Pecs.
The right-wing leader said that current punishments for murder, which include life sentences without recourse to parole, were "not enough of a deterrent".
He was speaking after the recent deadly stabbing of a young woman in the bungled robbery of a shop in nearby Kaposvar that has made headlines nationwide.
But the comments also follow a recent drop in poll ratings for Orban's Fidesz party and a rise in popularity for the extreme-right Jobbik party.
Orban, accused of having autocratic tendencies in his five years as premier, has also become more outspoken on immigration, last week calling EU rules "stupid".
His government announced last week a "public consultation" on immigration including on whether asylum-seekers should be made to work.
Jobbik, second in opinion polls and which this month won its first directly elected seat in parliament, supports the death penalty and is strongly anti-immigration.
Hungary abolished capital punishment after the end of communism in 1990 and under EU protocols -- it joined the bloc in 2004 -- cannot bring it back.
EU President Donald Tusk said Thursday: "The European Union is completely opposed to the death penalty." His comments came as Indonesia faces mounting international pressure not to execute a group of drug convicts, most of whom are foreigners.
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