Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said Wednesday that the decision to invite Ukraine to a meeting of NATO foreign ministers “undermines the principle of unity of the Alliance,” according to a government statement cited by CNN. At the same time, Hungary, through the voice of its Minister of Foreign Affairs, stated that under no circumstances does it want NATO to become an anti-Chinese bloc, hirado.hu reports, News.ro reports.

Peter Sijarto’s comment regarding Ukraine was made after the meeting of foreign ministers of NATO countries, which took place in Brussels on the occasion of Finland’s accession to NATO. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Dmytro Kuleba, was invited to the meeting, despite the fact that Ukraine is not currently a member of NATO.

Hungary has repeatedly stated its rejection of NATO’s participation in the conflict in Ukraine.

Hungary hopes that “no one will question the validity of the Alliance’s previous decision that NATO will not be a participant in the war that is going on in our neighboring country,” Szijarto said.

“Everything must be done to prevent a direct conflict between NATO and Russia,” he added.

Viktor Orbán’s Hungary has certainly been the Kremlin’s closest ally in the European bloc, CNN notes. Since Putin ordered his troops to invade Ukraine last year, Orbán has been the European Union’s most reluctant leader to impose sanctions on Russia.

Also, the head of Orbán’s administration recently stated that Hungary will not arrest Vladimir Putin if he enters the country, despite the fact that there is an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court in his name.

In addition, Hungary and Turkey are the only NATO members that have not ratified Sweden’s accession to NATO, and Budapest, following the example of Ankara, set the preconditions for Stockholm.

According to a press release from the Hungarian Foreign Ministry, Peter Szijjártó also said that his Finnish counterpart thanked Budapest for ratifying his country’s accession to NATO and “assured that Helsinki will seriously approach the situation with the rights of national minorities in Ukraine in Europe.” forums”.

Hungary, on the other hand, said that “as a loyal ally” it would respect NATO’s goal of increasing defense spending to at least two percent of gross domestic product (GDP) a year ahead of schedule.

Budapest does not want NATO to turn into an anti-Chinese bloc

In another position, Budapest stated that under no circumstances does it want NATO to turn into an anti-Chinese bloc, saying that instead of rivalry, mutually beneficial cooperation is needed. This was stated by Foreign Minister Peter Szijjártó on Wednesday during the meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels.

According to a press release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, during a press conference held after the meeting, the minister presented Hungary’s position on the agenda item on China and noted that the relationship should not be called military. “In fact, the less we describe this cooperation as a military relationship, the better,” he said. “We don’t want NATO to become an anti-Chinese bloc. We don’t see the sense of rivalry, we don’t see its logic and we don’t see that anything good can come out of it,” he stressed. , cited by MTI.

“We have not and do not want to enter into any competition that would create such systemic competition between China and Europe or between China and Hungary,” he added.

The minister noted that one of the worst consequences of the war in Ukraine is that the world is once again moving towards the bloc, which is particularly bad news for Central Europe, which has always been caught in the conflict between East and West. “We believe in communication, in creating and maintaining connections, not in the formation of blocs,” he said.

Minister Sijarto also gave an example: the political decisions made in Brussels will require a revolutionary renewal of the automotive industry, an important sector for the future of the European economy, as it will require investments of tens of billions of euros and the reorganization of the future strategy of the largest automotive companies in Western Europe. The minister said politicians had forgotten that while the continent had made the necessary developments to produce electric vehicles, it had not created the capacity to produce electric batteries, which are largely in the hands of Chinese companies in the sector. “That’s why everyone who demands the separation of the Chinese and European economies risks dealing a huge blow to the European economy,” he warned, calling for stronger cooperation with China.

China, like Russia, has important investments in Hungary, and Budapest has been repeatedly suspected of being Beijing’s Trojan horse in Europe.

Sijarto also talked about China’s peace plan for Ukraine, which, according to him, could be a good starting point for international negotiations. However, the West was quite reluctant about this. “We would like peace talks to start as soon as possible, with a ceasefire as soon as possible, because the sooner the ceasefire is, the more lives we can save in Ukraine,” said the head of Hungarian diplomacy.

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