Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said on public Kossuth Radio that some European leaders appear determined to move toward war, adding that Hungary refuses to take substantial sums out of its national budget to hand over to Ukraine. He noted he has drafted a reply to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who requested additional funding from member states for Ukraine, but will send it only after consulting EU Affairs Minister János Bóka. Orbán said his letter not only rejects the proposal but also explains the reasons and offers alternatives.
He argued that Europe must reverse what he called a political dead end. According to him, Brussels keeps making decisions that point toward deeper involvement in the war, and ‘some leaders clearly want to enter it.’ Beyond financial concerns, he said the key issue is how to keep Europe from sliding into open conflict.
Orbán criticized von der Leyen’s plan to raise 130 billion euros for Ukraine, saying Hungarian taxpayers’ money must remain in Hungary and cannot be diverted from businesses or family-support programmes. He rejected joint EU borrowing as well, arguing it would burden future generations, and opposed using frozen Russian assets without full clarity on the consequences.
He confirmed long-running rumours about a 28-point peace plan under secret negotiation, saying the coming weeks could be decisive for ending the Russia–Ukraine conflict and that developments appear to be leading toward a peace summit in Budapest.
Addressing recent corruption scandals in Ukraine, Orbán said large sums of international aid have disappeared, and the EU lacks a mechanism to track where the money ends up. He and Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó proposed creating such a system and suspending payments until oversight improves, but the idea was dismissed in Brussels.
He added that if Ukraine were already an EU member, Europe would effectively be at war with Russia. The stagnation of Western Balkan enlargement, he said, raises troubling questions about whether conflict is becoming a shortcut toward EU accession.
Orbán stressed that Hungary can stay out of the war only by holding its ground, just as it did on migration. The majority of Hungarians, he said, support peace, and this must be expressed politically. He accused the domestic opposition of aligning with Brussels and supporting a pro-war line.
Turning to economic policy, the prime minister highlighted the government’s newly adopted 11-point action plan to support small and medium-sized enterprises. He said economic debates are less visible than conflicts over migration or war, but equally complex. Hungary’s economy, he argued, is built on families and full employment, as the country lacks major natural resources and must rely on its own labour and innovation.
Orbán said Hungary can operate its economic model without mass immigration, relying only occasionally on guest workers, unlike Western Europe, which compensates labour shortages through migration. He criticized the Tisza Party’s economic leadership for its ‘banker mentality’, contrasting it with the government’s focus on everyday life and long-term wellbeing.
He concluded that Hungarian politics ultimately divides into two major blocs, and from the national side the candidates of the Tisza Party appear too Brussels-oriented and too supportive of Ukraine.
Related articles:
