Orbán in Kyiv: We appreciate President Zelensky's efforts towards peace

Despite previous information, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky did hold a brief press conference following Orbán's unannounced visit to Kyiv. The Ukrainian President and the Hungarian Prime Minister spoke only very briefly and the press was not given the opportunity to ask questions.

Zelensky said that he and Orbán had discussed basic issues of trade, cross-border cooperation, infrastructure and energy – as is to be expected from two neighbours. "We spoke about everything that affects the lives of the people of Ukraine and Hungary, including the situation of the Hungarian minority in Ukraine and opening the first Ukrainian school in Hungary," Unian quoted Zelensky as saying, who also added that the current talks could provide a good basis for an agreement between the two countries. With this, the Ukrainian president countered the statement of the Russian president's spokesman, who said that Orbán certainly went to Kyiv as part of Hungary's EU presidency, and that he was there to represent Brussels' interests, not Hungary's.

Speaking after Zelensky, Orbán said: "The rules of international diplomacy are slow and complicated. I asked the President to consider whether the order could be reversed and a quick ceasefire could be put in place to speed up the peace talks. A truce for a predetermined period of time, which would give us the opportunity to speed up the peace talks: I explored the possibilities for that," Orbán said, according to MTI, noting that "peace is a very important issue. The war in which you are living has a very intense impact on the security of Europe," Unian reported Orbán as saying, adding that he was “very grateful to Zelensky for his frank answer on this issue.”

As for exactly what Zelensky's response was is not clear from the reports, but Kyiv's position on this is well known: in the current situation, a ceasefire would only give Russia time to reinforce its defences in the occupied territories and then attack with renewed force.

The Russian Foreign Minister had previously said that his country would not halt military action on the front line even in the event of negotiations. After Sergey Lavrov's statement, the Russian president came up with what he called a peace proposal, although what Vladimir Putin described was virutally Ukraine's capitulation: He demanded the demilitarisation of Ukraine, the "denazification" of the country's leadership and the formal handover of the territories occupied so far to Russia, as well as Ukraine giving up the areas – in the provinces of Kherson, Zaporizhzhya, Donetsk and Luhansk – that Russian forces had failed to occupy during the war or had been forced to give up after the first phase of the war.

Orbán appreciates Zelensky's efforts

One of Orbán's key statements at the press conference stands in stark contrast to what the Hungarian government's rhetoric and the pro-government press have been suggesting, where Zelensky has been described an opponent to be defeated, someone who allies himself with the Hungarian opposition and a politician who would rather send children to war than seek peace. In contrast, when speaking in Kyiv,

Orbán said: "We very much appreciate all the initiatives that President Zelensky is taking to achieve peace," Unian wrote.

Ukraine is strong precisely because of what Orbán has been opposing

Hungary is not involved in strengthening Ukraine's military defences and has repeatedly expressed its opposition to NATO members helping Ukraine with weapons supplies.

Orbán has made several contradictory statements on the dangers of war in Ukraine: on the one hand, he has warned of the risk of a third world war, and on the other, he has ruled out the possibility of Russia attacking NATO. His main argument for the latter was that the abilities of the Russian forces fall short of NATO's military potential, as they are apparently no match for Ukraine either. Even though this is largely due to the fact that Ukraine had received the military assistance from the West that Hungary had been vehemently opposed to providing all along.

Reactions to the meeting from the Kremlin and the US

"The Kremlin expects nothing from Viktor Orbán's trip to Kyiv," the Russian presidential spokesman had previously said. Dmitry Peskov said that no information had been exchanged with the Hungarian side prior to Orbán's visit to Ukraine. The Hungarian Prime Minister is one of the last EU leaders to visit Kyiv, in the 28 months since Russia launched its attack on Ukraine.

"It is understandable that Hungary, having taken over the rotating EU presidency for this period, has to assume the responsibilities that come with it. So I think in this case it is fulfilling its obligations along the lines of Brussels' interests, not Hungarian national interests," Interfax quoted the Russian spokesman as saying.

US Ambassador to Hungary, David Pressman also reacted to the news of the Orbán-Zelensky meeting. In a social media post, he simply stated: “We welcome Prime Minister Orbán’s trip to Kyiv to engage Ukraine’s leadership. Progress.”

Read more about the unannounced visit and the background to Hungarian-Ukrainian relations in this article.