Hungary remains firm in blocking EU military aid to Ukraine
Hungary will not stop blocking military aid to Ukraine in the amount of 500 million euros within the framework of the European Peace Fund.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Hungary, Péter Szijártó, stated this, The Guardian reports.
According to the minister, the blocking will last until Ukraine provides Hungary with guarantees that it will no longer include the OTP Bank or other Hungarian companies on the international list of war sponsors.
According to Szijártó, today, November 13, during the Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the European Union meeting, they "tried to put pressure" on him to support the allocation of 500 million euros for aid to Ukraine. But he repeated that Budapest cannot support the initiative without guarantees from Kyiv.
It is worth noting that Hungary has been blocking the eighth tranche of the EU for Ukraine in the amount of EUR 500 million for several months.
As a condition, Budapest demanded that Ukraine exclude the OTP Bank from the list of war sponsors. However, the blockade continued even after Kyiv fulfilled this condition.
The EU also wants to create a special fund worth 20 billion euros to help Ukraine within the framework of the European Peace Fund. In order for such an initiative to be approved, the block is already developing a backup plan. The head of Lithuania's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Gabrielus Landsbergis, spoke about it today.
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On November 9, the European Commission proposed a support package for Ukraine for up to 18 billion euros for 2023. This assistance will be provided in the form of soft loans, which will be paid in regular installments starting in January 2023.
After months of wrangling, Budapest eventually agreed to the package after securing what it said were concessions from the European Union on aid to Hungary.
Asked if the EU would go down that road again if Hungary blocked aid, European Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said this week: "Last year we did discuss a 'plan B'… But we managed to avoid that scenario last year. Hopefully, we will also manage to avoid this scenario this year."
The Bloomberg agency reported the day before that an alternative proposal would include national guarantees of member states to attract financing in the markets if Budapest blocks the review of the EU's long-term budget, which includes aid to Ukraine.
Last month, the Financial Times reported that senior EU officials were mulling the idea of giving Hungary around 13 billion euros in EU funds that are currently blocked due to unresolved rule of law issues.
According to the FT, this move should encourage Budapest to increase the EU budget for 2024-2027, including the allocation of 50 billion euros for Ukraine for this period.
