Time to confront Europe's rogue state--Hungary

[Celerity]

For the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, the European Union is the enemy, not Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

https://socialeurope.eu/time-to-confront-europes-rogue-state-hungary



Russia’s unprovoked and brutal war of aggression against its western neighbour has prompted almost every European government to demonstrate its solidarity with Ukraine and its continuing commitment to the international rule of law. Since February, when Russian forces launched a full-scale invasion, numerous European leaders—including the presidents of Germany, France, Poland, Romania and the Baltic republics—have journeyed to Kyiv to hold talks with the beleaguered president, Volodymyr Zelenskii. So too have the premiers of Germany, Poland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Austria, Slovakia, Ireland and the United Kingdom. Boris Johnson visited the Ukrainian capital no fewer than three times as UK prime minister.

In marked contrast, Hungary’s premier, Viktor Orbán, has declined to make the symbolic journey. Instead, in July, Orbán paid an official visit to Serbia, the European country that—apart from Belarus—is most closely aligned with Russia. And in September his combative and serially undiplomatic foreign minister, Péter Szíjjártó, held amicable talks with his counterpart in Moscow, Sergey Lavrov. Very belatedly, on Saturday Hungary’s president, Katalin Novák, appeared in Kyiv, accompanied by the prime ministers of Belgium, Poland and Lithuania.

Political trajectory

For anyone who has followed Orbán’s political trajectory, his reluctance to visit Kyiv or to engage in talks with Zelenskii is unsurprising. So too have been his refusal to permit ‘lethal weapons’ to be sent to Ukraine through Hungarian territory, his attempts to impede efforts by the European Union to widen the scope of sanctions targeting Russia and his criticism of EU sanctions as ineffective and self-harming. Since returning to power in 2010, Orbán has fostered close economic and political ties with Moscow, prompting one commentator to label him a ‘Trojan horse’ for the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, inside the EU.

Orbán has sought to justify his opposition to wider sanctions and his refusal to support military aid to Ukraine—leaving him almost totally isolated in Europe—as principled and rational. ‘Hungary stands on the side of peace,’ he told the country’s parliament in late September. ‘Instead of continuing and deepening the war, we demand an immediate ceasefire and peace talks.’ Speaking in Băile Tuşnad in western Romania, in July, Orbán emphasised: ‘We Hungarians see this war as a war between two Slavic peoples, and as one which we want to stay out of.’

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[OnDoutside]

1. He deserves to get his comeuppance but the EU probably won't

move on him until the Ukraine situation is resolved.

[czarjak]

2. "You're either with us or against us"? F-Vlad.