The former Polish justice minister Zbigniew Ziobro escaped Hungary for the United States - on a journalist visa. Hungary was his asylum. Now it isn't. Why? Because Orbán's government fell, and the new prime minister Péter Magyar did something simple and dramatic: „Hungary will no longer be a refuge for internationally wanted criminals."

Ziobro has open proceedings in Poland for abuse of office, leading an organised criminal group, and illegal use of the Israeli spyware Pegasus to surveil political opponents. Maximum sentence - 25 years in prison. Polish authorities had previously confiscated his travel documents, including his diplomatic passport. The question - how did he end up in the US then?

The answer is the journalist visa. Ziobro received an American journalist visa tied to the Polish TV channel Republika, which then hired him as a political commentator. Poland's justice ministry - led by Waldemar Żurawski - says it will contact Washington and Budapest for an explanation, and will seek extradition if his presence is confirmed.

He's charged with misappropriating around 40 million euros - money earmarked for victims of crime, which he allegedly redirected to buy Pegasus. The bureaucratic translation: public money meant to help victims, siphoned off to surveil political opponents. That's the kind of charge that means political death in any country. In this case - with Orbán falling - it also meant a physical relocation.

The Magyar story matters for our region. „Hungary will no longer be a refuge for criminals" is a sentence the Balkans read as a threat. Because Budapest has, for more than a year, also been home to Nikola Gruevski - the former Macedonian PM, convicted with a final ruling, holding a Polish „tourist visa" with no oversight. With Magyar's decision - that's no longer a simple matter. The question is when the next step gets taken. And for whom that's going to be Ziobro, and for whom Gruevski.

Balkan politics doesn't run on laws. It runs on markets - even when the markets are called „political will." Orbán's protection market was open for 10 years. Magyar's market is closed. And that's one of those rarities in European politics - when one voter decision in one city (Budapest) changes the futures of people in ten other capitals.