Less than two meters separates the podiums from which Vitkor Orban and Volodymyr Zelensky speak at the press conference in Kiev. But it is their words that show the abysmal distance that has long divided the two leaders. Because in his surprise visit to the Ukrainian capital, the first since the Russian invasion began, the EU’s most pro-Putin leader called for what no other European partner had so far asked of the Ukrainian leader, much less at home: “an immediate ceasefire” to “accelerate peace negotiations” with Russia. Virtually without preconditions.
Zelensky made it clear that for Kiev there can only be “a just peace”without any concession to Moscow, inviting the Hungarian leader to “join the efforts” of Ukraine in this direction. And the day after the start of the Hungarian presidency of the EU, he relaunched the appeal for nothing to change in Europe in terms of military aid to Kiev: “It is very important that support for Ukraine remains at a sufficient level.also with regard to our defense against Russian terror.”
It’s no secret that there was bad blood between the two leaders. – emblematic in this sense is the lively exchange of views during the European Council summit in Brussels on 27 June. And with the words used in Kiev, Orban evidently wanted to send a clear message both to his European colleagues and to the Ukrainian leader, who only 24 hours earlier had said he hoped that Budapest could “effectively promote our shared European values, goals and interests”.
The one that the Hungarian Prime Minister maintains in relation to the other 26 leaders of the Union is a stubborn and contrary position on many of the dossiers related to Ukrainehaving also withdrawn from the obligation of military support in NATO. In introducing the visit, Budapest had announced that “the most important topic under discussion” would be “the possibility of building peace”. No trace of the topic in Zelensky’s report on X, who instead spoke of talks on “fundamental issues of our neighborly relations: trade, cross-border cooperation, infrastructure, energy” and “humanitarian sphere”.
On your part, The Kremlin downplayed the Hungarian leader’s visit to Kievstressing that he had “no expectations”: “Responsibilities in the context of Brussels’ interests will prevail”, according to spokesman Peskov, who assured that no talks had been held between Budapest and Moscow in view of Orban’s trip.
Contact was instead made in the evening between Hungarian Foreign Minister Szijjarto and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, also on the “Ukrainian crisis”, with attention to the issue of protecting the Hungarian minority living in the invaded country, a further reason for friction between Budapest and Kiev.
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin continues his maneuvers: after his stop in Pyongyang a few days ago, the tsar flew to Astana where he plans to meet Xi Jinping and Turkish President Erdogan on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit.
The Russian president has already made clear what his fixed points are for a possible peace with Ukraine: he wants five regions and the Ukrainian renunciation of its ambitions to join NATO. These requests are unacceptable for Kiev, which as the months go by is facing an increasingly difficult war on the front. Zelensky has received a new US military aid package worth 2.3 billion dollars with anti-tank weapons, interceptors, ammunition for Patriots and other air defense systems. But the results of this aid continue to be long in coming on the ground, where in the meantime Moscow is claiming villages and attacking cities and military facilities: the Russian Defense Ministry has declared that it destroyed seven Ukrainian military jets in a missile attack on the Myrhorod airport. Meanwhile Kiev is still waiting for the arrival of the F-16s, promised for this summer but not yet arrived.
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