Does Orban plan cooperation with Ukraine?

Hungary is the country that most of all blocked decisions useful for Ukraine over the past year. It is not only under the influence of Russia, but also a representative of the EU, which slows down the assistance of the entire European Union in the direction of important decisions in the Russian-Ukrainian war. Therefore, diplomatic work in this direction is very important.

Signs of hope

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Hungary Peter Szijjarto said that preparations for the official visit of the President of his country to Kyiv are underway. Now everything is at the stage of working out the technical details that go before the planned preparation of the visit. As soon as all conditions are met, the trip will begin to be planned in all detail.

9 years of silence

Before this, the President of Hungary had never been to Ukraine since 2014. This year was the beginning of Russia’s armed invasion of the territory of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, as well as the annexation of Crimea.

There was no dialogue either at the middle level or at the highest level. There are three main reasons for the opposition:

• Hungary’s negative reaction to the Ukrainian language law regarding teaching in the state language in 2017.
• The rights of the Hungarian national minority in Ukraine.
• Russian influence on Ukrainian-Hungarian relations.

The desire of the Russian side to provoke a conflict has given excellent results all this time.

What motivates Orban now?

Why, then, did the President of Hungary not decline the official invitation to visit Kyiv? There can also be three reasons:

• He is “instructed” on how to promote the interests of Russia in Kyiv, acting as a kind of “postman”.
• The West constantly puts pressure on Orban. No matter how much he supports the Kremlin, he remains inside the European political environment, from which he cannot completely distance himself.
• He understands more and more clearly that the support of the Kremlin will cause more economic and political problems than benefits.

Who will go?

On February 6, the Prime Minister of Hungary announced that he was planning to visit Kyiv. But later it turned out that the possibility of a meeting of the presidents was being considered. This would be a very expressive gesture for both Europe and Russia.