Outgoing European Council President Donald Tusk was elected the new president of the European People's Party (EPP) on Wednesday, DW reports.
The center-right EPP is the largest bloc within the EU Parliament.
In his first remarks after being elected, the Polish lawmaker vowed to fight "populists, manipulators and autocrats."
"We will not sacrifice values like civic liberties, the rule of law, and decency in a public life on the altar of security and order, because there is simply no need,'' he added.
The remarks, made at a congress in Zagreb, Croatia, may have been an attack on Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban's party Fidesz, which was suspended from the bloc earlier in the year. Fidesz were not invited to participate in the congress after initiating an anti-Brussels poster campaign.
"Someone also worked hard, putting up a fence and billboards with anti-migration propaganda," Tusk said in an apparent allusion to Orban.
"I'm ready to fight and I hope you are re...