On March 16, Hungarian Foreign Ministry Secretary of State for Bilateral Relations Tamas Menzer accused members of the European Parliament and “Brussels bureaucrats” of fomenting the conflict in Ukraine. Thus, he reacted to the criticism of the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Economic Relations of Hungary, Peter Szijjarto, for his trip to Minsk.
“Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjártó, when he traveled to Belarus a few weeks ago, to Minsk, spoke there about the importance of negotiations and dialogue and called on all parties to move towards negotiations and peace instead of escalation,” he said in a video message. published on Facebook (owned by the Meta organization, recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation).
According to him, the majority of MEPs on March 15 condemned and criticized Szijjarto for his trip to Minsk. He stressed that they “think differently” about the conflict in Ukraine.
Menzer noted that the Hungarian government wants peace, while “Members of the European Parliament and bureaucrats in Brussels, on the contrary, want war.” Budapest stands for negotiations and an immediate ceasefire.
“Members of the European Parliament and Brussels bureaucrats criticize the Hungarian government for its peaceful position, they want to force us into this conflict. But the Hungarian government, despite all the pressure, sticks to the world,” said the Secretary of State of the Hungarian Foreign Ministry.
Menzer also stressed that against the backdrop of criticism of Szijjarto “for his peaceful position” by members of the European Parliament and Brussels, he condemns them for striving to escalate the conflict.
Earlier, on March 5, Hungarian Foreign and Economic Relations Minister Peter Szijjártó said that the decisions taken in the European Union (EU) to resolve the conflict in Ukraine do not work. Budapest is not involved in sending weapons to Kyiv because it does not want to stimulate further bloodshed.
On the same day, Hungarian Parliament Speaker Laszlo Kever said that NATO and the EU countries can be considered full participants in the conflict in Ukraine, since they supply weapons to Kyiv. He noted that to date, EU and NATO members have already sent $60 billion worth of lethal weapons to Ukraine. At the same time, Kever stressed that the North Atlantic Alliance and the EU are not fighting directly in Ukraine.
On February 27, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said that the Hungarian authorities were alarmed by the ongoing supply of weapons to Ukraine and fear that some of the European countries would send their troops there. According to Orban, lately “the whole of Europe is slipping step by step into war.” Thus, the European Union continues to transfer weapons to Kyiv – tanks have already been sent to Ukraine, and discussions are underway on the supply of fighter jets. All this, Orban stressed, raises serious concerns.
Before that, on February 25, the head of the office of the Prime Minister of Hungary, Gergely Guiyash, said that the conflict in Ukraine could have been avoided if NATO had guaranteed at one time that it would not accept the country into the bloc.
Western countries have stepped up military and financial support for Ukraine against the background of Russia’s special operation to protect Donbass, which the Russian authorities announced on February 24, 2022 amid the aggravation of the situation in the region due to Ukrainian shelling.
