A Hungarian court on Wednesday ordered one month of pre-trial detention for Aron Orban, the younger brother of former Prime Minister Viktor Orban, on suspicion of human trafficking.

The Budapest court also remanded Orban's live-in partner into custody for one month, while placing a third suspect under criminal supervision for four months and releasing the fourth. The four were arrested on Monday in coordinated raids in Budapest, Fót and Dunakeszi. The operation was led by the National Bureau of Investigation and the National Asset Recovery and Protection Office, with support from Europol and the Counter-Terrorism Center.

Prosecutors allege that since 2022 the group operated as a criminal organization helping more than 100 Vietnamese citizens obtain visas at Hungarian diplomatic missions in Vietnam. They charged each migrant a "recruitment fee" and split the proceeds, investigators say. Many of the visa holders allegedly never attended the short training programs they cited as their reason for travel and instead continued to Western Europe.

The court found sufficient grounds for suspicion against all four and cited flight risk for the three subject to coercive measures. For Orban and his partner, judges also cited the risk of obstructing the investigation by influencing future testimony. If convicted of human trafficking, the suspects face five to 10 years in prison.

Viktor Orban reacted on social media on Monday, accusing the current government of trying to eliminate political opponents. "I am the target, my brother is only a tool," he wrote on Facebook. Prime Minister Peter Magyar, whose government took power in May, said before the hearing that "in a mafia state there are untouchables, but in a rule-of-law state everyone is equal before the law."

Orban's defense attorney, Eva Edit Schalkház, said after the hearing that her client had given a statement but that there was no evidence to support reasonable suspicion for detention. "It is nonsense that there is a risk of flight, hiding, influencing witnesses or destroying evidence when he himself appeared in writing before the authorities and offered everything," she said.

The investigation follows reporting by the news site Telex, which first detailed Aron Orban's business dealings in May 2025. The reporting came after a leaked audio recording showed him discussing visa applications for guest workers with an aide to Viktor Orban at the Prime Minister's Office.