Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry has summoned Hungarian Ambassador to Kyiv Istvan Ijgyarto for a “frank conversation” following Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s words that Ukraine is a “no man’s land”. This was announced by the official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Oleg Nikolenko on Facebook.
“Another despicable statement by Viktor Orban to Ukraine. Such statements are categorically unacceptable. Budapest is deliberately destroying Hungarian-Ukrainian relations, significantly undermining the possibility of further dialogue between the two neighbors,” he said.
In my country blocked
present tense
On January 26, Orban said at a meeting with reporters that “Putin cannot afford to lose and will not lose,” as he will participate in the presidential election in 2024, and the West needs to understand this, reports The American Conservative, whose representative was present at the meeting.
According to Orban, Russia also cannot allow NATO to “establish its presence” in Ukraine, so Putin’s goal is to turn the country into “unmanaged ruins” so that the West cannot present it as its “prize”.
“Now it’s Afghanistan. No man’s land,” The American Conservative quoted the Hungarian prime minister as saying.
In November 2022, Orban appeared in public during a friendly match in Budapest between the national teams of Hungary and Greece, wearing a scarf depicting a map of Hungary within the 1920 borders, when the country included parts of Romania, Austria, Slovakia, Serbia, Croatia and Transcarpathia. which is now part of Ukraine. This led to a scandal – the Hungarian ambassadors in Kyiv and Bucharest were summoned to the foreign ministries of Ukraine and Romania.
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry demanded an apology from the Hungarian side and a refutation of the encroachment on the country’s territorial integrity. Orban himself later wrote on Facebook: “Football is not politics. Let’s not look for what is not there. The Hungarian national team is the team of every Hungarian, wherever he lives.”
The current prime minister, Orban, has been criticized for the close ties between Budapest and Moscow that have developed in recent years and his refusal to provide Ukraine with military assistance to counter a full-scale Russian invasion. In particular, on March 26, 2022, the Hungarian Prime Minister announced that he would not support the embargo on Russian oil and gas, and Zelensky’s demands for military assistance and sanctions against Russia, according to him, are contrary to the interests of Hungary and will negatively affect the economy.
