Visegrád Post was a multilingual online news platform founded in Budapest by Ferenc Almássy (born François Lavallou) and launched in March 2016, It published in English, French, and German on Central European politics and culture, focusing on the Visegrád Group. Positioning itself as a conservative voice for "mainstream" regional views emphasizing sovereignty and traditional values.
It has faced intense scrutiny over Russian ties, following allegations by security services that it was bankrolled by the sanctioned Voice of Europe network run by pro-Kremlin oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk.
Visegrád post was linked to Hungarian far-right Our Homeland Movement, Jobbik (formerly far-right) and neo-Nazi Pax Hungarica Movement, Russian separatists in Eastern Ukraine, and other far-right organizations, including Poland's Ordo Iuris and Law and Justice party circles, as well as French wing of Sixty-Four Counties Youth Movement, National Rally and Institut Iliade circles.
European intelligence, including Czech BIS, continues investigating it in 2025 for disinformation and hybrid threats.
Activities slowed at the start of 2024, with the final articles published by mid-year. In an interview at the end of 2024, Almássy mentioned that he had been living in Ethiopia since June.
In 2025, the Visegrád Post domain reportedly changed ownership, and a new outlet, run by the Israeli company ORMEDIA LTD, subsequently appeared. All information in this article are related to the period prior to this change.
History Ferenc Almássy, the founder of the Visegrád Post, was raised in France. His mother is Hungarian and father is French. After dropping out of university in Paris, he moved to Hungary in 2010 at the age of 22, where he began working for a multinational company. The idea emerged in the summer of 2015. With the help of a sponsor and following the establishment of a partnership with the French far-right and Russia linked web-based channel TV Libertés, the outlet was launched in late March 2016. On 2 September 2016, Almássy registered the company LALMA Consulting Hungary Kft., which was listed as the publisher ("editor").
In Hungary, Almássy has not only managed the Visegrád Post but has also contributed to TV Libertés and the weekly Magyar Demokrata and the daily Magyar Nemzet. Another connection to TV Libertés is Nicolas de Lamberterie, a French journalist and Central Europe correspondent for various media outlets, based in Budapest, who has played a prominent role in the Visegrád Post. Le Monde even describes him as a co-founder of the outlet and the Hungarian weekly HVG attributed him the management of the site along with Almássy.
TV Libertés was listed as the main partner of Visegrád Post. According to information provided on the website, it's partners also included Hungarian daily Magyar Nemzer, the Polish weekly Do Rzeczy, and the related portal Sovereignty.pl, the Kurier Plus website, owned by the state-owned Felczak Institute, and the Polish Economic Forum.
It published heavily ideologized content, including materials attacking LGBT+ communities and the European Union, supporting Viktor Orbán's government - considered the most pro-Russian in the EU - and even attacking pro-democratic politicians such as Donald Tusk. Over time, it has interviewed key political figures, including those associated with Hungary's Fidesz party and other far-right movements in Europe. In May 2018, they published an interview with Alexander Dugin about the Visegrad Group, authorized by Dugin's Geopolitika, where it was originally published.
Contributors have included journalists like Olivier Bault (based in Warsaw since the 1990s), Yann Caspar, Nicolas de Lamberterie, David Engels, Sébastien Meuwissen, Thibaud Gibelin, Bill Ravotti, Gabriel Cruz (a UK-based writer), and Alimuddin Usmani (a Swiss journalist of Czech-Pakistani origin who has conducted numerous interviews with Czech politicians and frequently visited Prague).
In early 2017, Almássy said he was the editor-in-chief and the outlet's only full-time employee, earning €500-600 a month. At the time, the average monthly wage in Hungary was about €962 and €1,221 in Budapest. The outlet did not operate on a subscription basis and carried no advertising, meaning it had no income from advertising either. Although Almássy claimed at least since 2019 that the outlet was "financed exclusively through donations", findings confirmed that it nonetheless benefited from subsidies drawn from Hungarian public funds. In 2018, he successfully applied for a grant from the National Cultural Fund (NKA) for the further development of the Visegrád Post project.
In December 2023, Almássy moderated a discussion for Voice of Europe featuring Maximilian Krah, Jorge Buxadé, Milan Uhrík and Ladislav Ilčić. The discussion was published under the headline "Possible Ukraine's EU accession - propaganda: MEPs discussed potential risks." Although the video is no longer available, Hungarian weekly HVG archived screenshots and the corresponding YouTube and outlet page was also preserved in the web archive. This demonstrates Almássy's direct connection to Voice of Europe.
Publication of articles and activity on social media accounts quieted down at the end of December 2023, although some new content continued to appear sporadically during the first half of 2024. In an interview with Hungarian Conservative published on 31 December 2024, Almássy told Álvaro Peñas that he had been living in Ethiopia since June and that he had "dramatically changed his life this year by joining the French Catholic NGO SOS Chrétiens d'Orient to help Christians in need."
In 2025, the Visegrád Post domain reportedly changed hands, and a new outlet subsequently emerged, operated by the Israeli Tel Aviv-Yafo–based company ORMEDIA LTD. One continuing link is Gabriel Cruz, a UK-based writer who has contributed to the outlet since its founding in 2016 and remains listed as a member of the editorial team, with his articles from 2016 onwards still accessible.
On 6 June 2025, Almássy posted a review comment on the newly created Visegrád Post Facebook page associated with the new domain owner: "They have stolen a brand to make a AI generated piece of s***. Garbage."
Background in Hungary and links to the Hungarian government The Visegrád Post new media outlet and its key figures maintained intensive relations with Hungary's pro-government media ecosystem and political structures, while also receiving direct state financial support. Although the outlet presents itself as an independent Christian-conservative voice of the Visegrád Group region, investigative journalism and intelligence services point to its role in spreading Hungarian government narratives toward foreign audiences.
State funding Although the portal officially claimed that its operations were funded by reader donations, analyses have proven direct financial support from Hungarian public sources. In 2019–2020, the company Lalma Consulting Hungary Kft., owned by the outlet's founder Almássy, received a grant of 4 million forints (about 12,300 euros in 2019) from the National Cultural Fund (NKA). These funds were allocated directly from the special budget framework of then Minister of Human Resources Miklós Kásler, designated for the "further development" of the foreign-language portal.
Editorial orientation and government involvement In its reporting on Hungary, Visegrád Post relies almost exclusively on pro-government information sources. The most frequently cited media include Mandiner, Magyar Nemzet, the state news agency MTI, and public broadcasters such as M1 and Híradó. The portal functioned as a platform that conducted or republished interviews in English, French, and German with senior representatives and key figures of the ruling Fidesz party. Among those were interviews with:
Viktor Orbán, Prime Minister; Katalin Novák, former President of Hungary; Judit Varga, former Minister of Justice; László Kövér, Speaker of Parliament; Zoltán Kovács, State Secretary for Government Communication; Tristan Azbej, State Secretary for the Aid of Persecuted Christians; András Gyürk, Fidész MEP; András Bencsik and László Bogár, journalists associated with Fidész.
According to critics, the portal's goal is to create the impression abroad that political and social developments in Central Europe are evolving optimally in line with government priorities.
Media presence of key figures The portal's founder Ferenc Almássy and key contributor Nicolas de Lamberterie frequently appear on Hungarian pro-government television channels, particularly news channel Hír TV (and previously the now-defunct Echo TV). Almássy has appeared in these media at least 16 times, presenting himself as an expert on French politics or the war in Ukraine. In addition, Almássy contributes as a writer to pro-government weekly Magyar Demokrata and daily Magyar Nemzet. Before the European Union banned broadcasting of the Russian state television Russia Today (RT), Almássy was also a regular guest of its French service, where he defended Hungarian government policies.
Connections to extremist groups In addition to ties with the ruling Fidesz party, leading figures of the portal are also close to the Hungarian far-right, specifically the Mi Hazánk party. Nicolas de Lamberterie, who has a past in extremist movements, for example, Sixty-Four countries Youth Movement (HVIM) founded by László Toroczkai in 2001, writes for the party newspaper Magyar Jelen. Mi Hazánk leader László Toroczkai cooperated with the Visegrád Post and participated in conferences it organized. Visegrád Post also conducted interviews with him in 2017 and 2023. Investigative reports highlight Toroczkai's indirect GRU link through a 2016 ceremony with a Russian spy, contextualized within his extremist movement's pro-Russian activities like anti-Ukraine rhetoric. In July 2020, Visegrád Post conducted and published an interview with Péter Jakab, who was at the time the president of Jobbik. He resigned from the party leadership in 2022 following a series of scandals and internal disputes, and had previously faced criticism for antisemitic statements.
International ties
France TV Libertés, the founding and main partner of Visegrád Post, was an channel known for disseminating pro-Russian narratives, established earlier in January 2014 by a group led by Philippe Milliau (president) and former Front National figure Martial Bild (editor-in-chief). TV Libertés had engaged in coverage of developments in Eastern Ukraine, including the elections in Donetsk and Luhansk. In September 2014. At the time, TV Libertés accompanied the French "fake election observer" Jean-Luc Schaffhauser, for whom Nicolas de Lamberterie worked as an assistant during his term as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP 2014–2019). Schaffhauser also played a central role in arranging a 9.4 million euro loan from the Moscow-linked First Czech Russian Bank (FCRB) to Marine Le Pen's Front National in 2014. TV Libertés was also the only television channel permitted to cover a meeting with State Duma Chairman Sergey Naryshkin, held at the Russian Embassy in Paris and organized by the French-Russian Dialogue Association, which was co-chaired by Thierry Mariani and Vladimir Yakunin.