Shortly before the EU summit, Hungary appears ready to negotiate: in exchange for 30 billion euros in EU money, the country wants to talk about aid to Ukraine from the EU budget. However, Prime Minister Orban remains tough on the subject of accession talks.
One day before the EU summit on financial aid for Ukraine and the possible start of accession talks, the government in Budapest is putting its cards on the table again. In a parliamentary debate, Viktor Orban affirmed: If he has his way, Ukraine should not become a member of the EU.
“You can and must support Ukraine. But no one can demand that we destroy Hungary because of it,” said the Prime Minister. “We are interested in a peaceful and prosperous Ukraine.” But that requires peace as quickly as possible. “The time for Ukraine to join the EU has not yet come.”
weapons shipments “do not help peace”
Fidesz parliamentary group leader Máté Kocsis, who is calling for a stop to all arms deliveries to Ukraine, explains exactly how peace can be achieved in Ukraine in the imagination of Orban and his national-conservative party friends. At the beginning of the war there were comments about protective equipment and helmets. And now the EU countries are already sending fighter jets, helicopters, missile systems, tanks and even more ammunition “to the theater of war,” says Kocsis. “All of this doesn’t help peace. Rather, it exacerbates the conflict and even increases the likelihood of a world war day by day.”
No weapons, no EU accession – Budapest is maintaining the threat of blocking the EU summit. The question is whether the EU can and wants to convince Hungary with money. For the time being, the EU Commission decided today against releasing ten billion euros to Hungary.
Can Hungary be convinced with money?
In the Budapest parliament, Fidesz MP Barna Pál Zsigmond is unimpressed and incorruptible: “On behalf of the Fidesz faction, we condemn and reject all political and financial pressure that is intended to force Hungary to change its sovereign position.”
However, the Orbán government doesn’t seem to be all that uninterested in financial pressure. The prime minister’s closest political adviser, Balazs Orban, who is not related to him, had signaled a willingness to negotiate a billion-dollar aid package for Ukraine, which is also to be decided at the EU summit.
Balazs Orban told the Bloomberg news agency that in return the EU should release all of the frozen funds for Hungary, which is around 30 billion euros. He is calling on the EU to drop its concerns about the rule of law. As of now, the money should actually only flow to Hungary if the country initiates reforms in return. Budapest now appears to be trying to extract the money.
Opposition: It’s all about the money
Gergely Arató from the opposition Democratic Coalition does not buy Orban and his Fidesz’s concerns about Ukraine joining the EU. According to him, it’s all about money. “It’s clear: They don’t have a problem with corruption in Ukraine; the problem is that they don’t have enough money for corruption in Hungary!”
According to Arató, Viktor Orban himself was once an advocate of Ukraine joining the EU in order to strengthen the union. But there doesn’t seem to be much of this European-friendliness left.
Silke Hahne, ARD Vienna, tagesschau, December 13th, 2023 2:26 p.m