United opposition parties have filed a motion of no confidence against Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico over his ties with Vladimir Putin and his pro-peace stance on the war in Ukraine. Fico, who survived an assassination attempt in May, has halted state-level weapon shipments to Kyiv and remains in constant conflict with Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Vladimir Putin has reportedly endorsed the Christmas ceasefire proposal by Viktor Orbán. Reflecting on the peace mission and Hungary’s EU Presidency, the Hungarian prime minister stated: ‘We have opened the door, and meaningful negotiations can now begin.’
After meeting with US President-elect Donald Trump in Florida on Tuesday and having a lengthy phone call with President Vladimir Putin of Russia on Wednesday, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán of Hungary travelled to Ankara, Türkiye to continue discussions about the potential peace in the Russo-Ukrainian war with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Türkiye this time.
One of the most pressing issues in enhancing the competitiveness of Europe is the need to optimize defence spending. Europeans now spend much more on defence in the wake of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, with ten European NATO members set to reach the 2 per cent of GDP spending threshold by the end of 2024. However, developing and acquiring modern weapon systems of cutting-edge technology demand an exponential level of spending for development and production, which can hamstring the capabilities of nation-states if they want to fit out their armies fully with domestically produced equipment, from building tools to jet fighters.
Kamala Harris, known for struggling in unscripted appearances, recently labelled Viktor Orbán, Vladimir Putin, and Xi Jinping as dictators and murderers on a late-night show. This extreme rhetoric is unfortunately common among Democrats, with Joe Biden previously making similar remarks about the Hungarian Prime Minister.
‘The gradual diminishing of Europe’s importance in the eyes of the successive US administrations in the twenty-first century has been arrested by Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, and weakened the “pivot” or “rebalance” to Asia for the time being: emergencies have cropped up elsewhere. As Joseph Stalin may be said to have been one of the “founding fathers” of NATO, so may Vladimir Putin be seen in a similar role with regard to the revival of NATO, and closer US–EU cooperation.’
Shortly after assuming the presidency of the European Union, Viktor Orbán visited Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, followed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, to facilitate the end of the Russo-Ukrainian war.
US Ambassador to Hungary David Pressman was quick to condemn PM Viktor Orbán’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing on the social media platform X., suggesting the Hungarian prime minister was ‘pleading for business deals’. In response, Balázs Orbán pointed out that the US has in fact doubled its import of enriched uranium from Russia since the start of the war.
Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested a one-and-a-half-day truce in the Russo-Ukrainian war, but the Ukrainian leadership and their Western allies do not want any part of it, considering Moscow’s proposal a sham. To what extent the guns on the front will die down until Saturday evening is highly questionable.
Why has the majority of the international community criminalised Vladimir Putin, but has for the past seven years refrained from publicly challenging or criticising the US government’s implicit role in the Yemeni genocide?