Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán declared that Hungary “belongs to the peace camp” in relation to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
Hungarian State Secretary for International Relations Zoltan Kovacs quoted Orban as saying Hungary supported “an immediate cease-fire in order to avoid further deaths.”
Hungary has historically had fraught relations with Russia and Ukraine, the latter of which currently shares a border with Hungary. Previously, both Ukraine and Russia were part of the Soviet Union, which invaded Hungary in 1956 after Hungarians rebelled against Soviet influence.
However, relations with Russia improved somewhat in the 2000s and 2010s over Hungary’s energy needs, and efforts by the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama to distance the United States from Hungary. Orbán has suggested that U.S. global decline has made a diversification of Hungary’s international relations more important.
Relations between Hungary and Ukraine deteriorated during the 2010s, as Hungary alleged that Ukraine was mistreating its ethnically Hungarian minority. Consequently, Zelensky advocated for the defeat of Orbán during the 2022 Hungarian elections.
Orbán’s stand mirrors pro-peace stances taken by other major global leaders such as former U.S. President Donald Trump, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. However, the United States under Joe Biden has pledged an aggressive approach in countering the Russian military activity in Ukraine, rather than advocating for and facilitating a peace deal between the two warring nations.
