Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said today that there would be “legal consequences” for organizing or participating in Budapest Pride in violation of a police ban on the event scheduled for tomorrow in Hungary’s capital.

Last week, Hungarian police banned the LGBT+ community march planned for Saturday, citing a law passed in March that said the protection of children should take precedence over the right to assembly.

However, the liberal mayor of Budapest and the march organizers said Budapest Pride will take place despite the ban, as it is a municipal event and therefore does not require a permit from the authorities.

“We are adults and I suggest that everyone decides what they want, respecting the rules … and if they don’t, then they should face clear legal consequences,” Orban told state radio.

He said police could break up a banned event, but Hungary is a “civilized country” and it is the job of the police to persuade citizens to obey the law.

“We are in the world not to make other people’s lives harder but easier, that is the essence of Christianity,” Orban said.

Orban’s critics see the ban on the march as part of a broader suppression of democratic freedoms ahead of elections next year, when the prime minister will face a strong opposition candidate.

Orban, who has been in power since 2010 in this central European country that is an EU member, is a defender of family values and in February warned organisers not to even consider holding this year’s march.

Britain, France, Germany and 30 other countries expressed their support for Hungary’s LGBTQ+ community and the pride march on Monday, while European Commission President Orsula von der Leyen urged Hungarian authorities to allow the event, which Orbán, in his radio interview, likened to taking orders from Moscow in the communist era.

“Just like Moscow, (the commission president) considers Hungary a subordinate country and thinks she can give the Hungarians orders from Brussels on how to live, what to like and what not to like,” Orban said.

Orban’s government promotes a strictly Christian-conservative agenda and has passed many laws affecting the lives of members of the LGBTQ+ community over the past decade.