since then, budapest and bratislava will continue to import russian oil. this is not the only source of imports, but it is significant. so, if the flow of oil were to stop completely, and it hasn't, that would be a major blow to the energy security of both countries, but again, we're not there yet. as for hungary's reaction, it should be noted that budapest's immediate reaction was the announcement of its intention to block the european peace fund. this fund, this amount of money of about 6.5 billion euros, which should compensate those eu countries that provide ukraine with military help therefore, budapest initially blocks the payment of these 6.5 billion euros. de facto, it does not directly harm ukraine, it harms european countries that help ukraine. but this is a kind of indirect measure. budapest has effectively blocked this european peace fund for... a long

time, citing various reasons. so, it will definitely happen. budapest will continue to block the european peace fund, but this block has lasted for years. in addition, hungary appealed to the european commission with a request to put pressure on ukraine, but the european commission replied that for now more information, more investigations are needed, so there will be no direct intervention by the european commission, at least for now. currently, because hungary has already chosen essentially the maximum escalation. that is, the blocking of the european peace fund for 6.5 billion euros. i don't expect that budapest can do much more. yes, you hear from hungarian officials that hungary can block the prospects of ukraine joining the eu, but joining the eu is a long way. me several years before ukraine will be able to join the european union. it will definitely happen, but it won't be a quick process. so in the short term.

president of the european council, charles michel , called viktor orban's trip not only to moscow, but also to beijing and washington a political mistake. he also stated that the european union reacted to this with a yellow card. does brussels have the power to finally show viktor orbán a red card. we need to define what red is. card. if

we stick to the football metaphor, then a red card means that the player must leave the field. this will not happen, no one can be kicked out of the european union. so, unlike in football, here he can have a few yellow cards and still stay in the game for now. the trip to moscow, as well as the trip to beijing, and the way those trips were conducted, is a serious violation. so, within the european union, certain it caused a big scandal and publicity, political countermeasures have already been applied. for example, some eu member states are boycotting high-level meetings of the hungarian eu presidency, viktor orbán, on...

asked the european parliament to present their presidential program. the head of the european commission, ursula vonlein, is not going to come to budapest, which is a very strong diplomatic signal. however, when it comes to practical countermeasures, punitive measures of sorts, the eu can do nothing. unlike in football, a player who breaks the rules will not be sent off the field of play, but he will have much less opportunity to achieve something in the game, and this is what will happen to hungary, it is already happening to them, it is already clear that the trip to moscow inflicted serious reputational losses on hungary in terms of the prestige and trust of allies. meanwhile, it is not at all clear that hungary benefited from this trip, so the minuses are clear, but no one noted the pluses. the organization of the moscow

trip, the things that orbán and putin discussed, and the purpose of all this remains a kind of mystery, a kind of secret, it is simply not clear that hungary benefited from it. but it is clear that she has lost. can we say that mr. orbán is somehow dependent on putin, based on what we have seen under the time of his trip to russia and from what he said when he returned. it is very difficult to assess, the last time they met was in beijing, already then during the beijing games. it was actually very telling, it's very difficult for an eu or nato prime minister. if putin called them to go, then they had to

go. such was the previous meeting. regarding the current meeting, which took place two days after the trip to kyiv. the hungarian narrative is that it was budapest that initiated it, but again, it is not clear what hungary actually gained from it. instead, it is quite clear what russia got. it was very interesting to watch how russian state media covered this visit. when putin and orbán started a discussion, literally in the fifth sentence, putin called orbán an envoy of the european union, which is technically certainly not true. but all the russian media covered orban's visit as if the president had come to moscow. union, showing how important a player russia is, that it is not isolated at all. for several days , all russian state media actually celebrated this meeting, noting how much putin is an important player for the president of the european union. so, from the point of view of domestic politics, russia won a lot,

which was very beneficial for it. why was it good for hungary? i honestly don't know. mr. orbán also said that he has. some kind of peace plan for ukraine, you know the details of this peace plan, i tried to find it on the internet, but i couldn't find anything, uh, it's not your fault, there is no plan, this narrative about the plan is actually very interesting, because orbán does not have three things necessary for mediation firstly, he has no plan, secondly, he has no mandate, no one else can provide it, thirdly, he has no legitimacy, so it is interesting to imagine why orbán has declared that he is going to promote peace in ukraine, to let's also not forget that in order

to achieve peace, a ceasefire is first needed, so the pre-peace plan should be a ceasefire, this is a technical detail. as for the plan itself, there is no orbán plan, when he met with president zelensky, he called for some strange form of segmented termination of fire, but it was not detailed, and i am not aware of any document that elaborates on this idea of ​​a segmented ceasefire. when he went to moscow, he didn't even get to say a word, because putin said almost immediately that russia was not ready to accept any external peace plan. and that the war should end according to the russian

position. this is the ultimatum that russia announced just a day before the peace summit regarding ukraine and switzerland. the same ultimatum as you you know very well, ukraine must completely renounce the donetsk, luhansk, zaporizhzhia and kherson regions and crimea. the ukrainian army should completely withdraw its troops from these regions, ukraine should forget about the intention to join nato and so on. so basically, putin didn't even let orbán explain his own ideas. instead, he issued the usual russian ultimatums. when orbán went to beijing, he did the third thing, he praised the chinese peace plan, the same chinese peace plan, or the settlement plan that china proposed in the first war anniversary so, in kyiv, moscow and

beijing, orbán basically voiced three different plans, so i don't see him having his own plan, it's the lack of a plan. as for the lack of a mandate, no one asked hungary to mediate in this war, no one asked hungary to do anything in the war. in order to be successful in mediation efforts, one must have a mandate to do so. this leads to the third point: lack of trust. currently, hungary does not have the confidence within the eu and nato necessary for any mediation efforts. relations between hungary and ukraine have long been tense. so, if ukraine were to ask any country to become a mediator, it would most likely not be hungary, right? that 's putting it mildly. and if we talk about russia, from their point of view, hungary still remains primarily a country of the eu and nato, a member of two alliances that moscow perceives as enemies. therefore , it would be very unusual if russia decided to trust orbán, so orbán is a useful

tool for moscow, and hungarian foreign policy for russian diplomacy, but this does not mean at all that there is a conflict between them trust, so even the three basic requirements needed for any kind of peace mediation, mandate, trust and a plan, are all missing, so you are not the only one who has not found his position, what exactly is going on, there is no such thing as orbán's plan. orbán always says that the hungarian government will continue to provide humanitarian aid to ukraine, but not weapons, because this could bring the war closer to the hungarian borders, is he really afraid of that? as far as i know, not already, in the first days, or in the first weeks of a full-scale war, when it was not yet clear whether he could

ukraine to stand and how many territories are actually occupied by the russians, maybe so. but after ukraine won at kiev, after ukraine managed to push the russians out of mykolaiv oblast, then to liberate part of kherson oblast, then to liberate kharkiv oblast, and after the front was basically stabilized in october 22nd , since then none one could not have thought that the russian army would ever come much closer to hungary. it's not something that anyone seriously fears from the hungarian side, i mean, one can think or say a lot of bad things about hungarian diplomacy or foreign policy, but the people who deal with it are professionals. at a certain level , hungary exchanges information with the eu and nato, so budapest has data to correctly assess

the situation. therefore, the argument, or a kind of argument, that budapest does not give weapons because these weapons will bring the front line closer to hungary, does not make sense. it's more like an excuse. i thought so too. let's talk a little more about the relationship between hungary and the european union. the biggest question i have is why prime minister orbán is so intensely quarreling with the eu leadership. what does he want to achieve with this? in hungary, there are problems related to the rule of law, because of this , several billion euros of eu financial support

for hungary have been frozen, so budapest does not have access to them. in my assessment, hungary's interest lies in normalizing relations with the european union, solving problems related to the rule of law, and at the same time ensuring that the blocked eu funds begin to flow to hungary. this is what the new polish government immediately did, after to which the european commission immediately reacted and began to direct previously suspended funds to poland. hungary clearly follows a different approach, the highly confrontational policies pursued by orbán seem to serve almost exclusively domestic political interests. in

the area of ​​rule of law, the european union requires hungary to dismantle some key institutional components of the orbán regime, control over mass media, suppression of civil society, influence on the judicial system and some other things. without these changes, hungary will not have access to frozen eu assets. viktor orban needs to be elected. between the security interests of his regime and the financial interests of the country, since they conflict with each other and between the financial and between the financial, as in every authoritarian system, he chooses the security interests of his own regime, because if orbán decides to comply with the eu's demands, it will mean that he himself will need to deconstruct key elements of the regime that guarantee its own power. it's highly unlikely that he 'll go for it, so he opts for open instead

confrontation, tries to create a situation where in domestic politics, for the domestic audience, he... he can try to present the whole story so that hungary does not receive eu money because of the eu's fault, because the eu hates hungary, because the eu discriminates against hungary, for example due to the fact that hungary pursues a certain peace policy that is against the interests of the eu, so it is mostly an internal political game. there is also an element of opacity, the hungarian government is less and less. believes in the possibility of receiving this money from the european union, there is an opinion that that money is essentially lost, and when they no longer hope to get that money back, they can afford to continue the confrontation because they have nothing left to lose. i'm

quite pessimistic about unfortunately, i expect that... the region, especially in the bereiv district, there are quite a lot of ethnic hungarians living there, and prime minister orbán always says that he is going to protect this minority and will do everything for it it is possible that he can do to protect the minority and is he just saying this to push his political agenda.

i'm afraid it's more likely the second. there were several cases when hungary's foreign policy actually harmed the interests of the hungarian minority living in ukraine. for example, military support is one such case. hundreds of ukrainian citizens of hungarian origin live in ukraine, hundreds of them fight in the ukrainian army for the freedom and sovereignty of ukraine. dozens of them have already died, the exact number is classified, but it is quite large. so, there are ethnic hungarians who are actively fighting for ukraine. if hungary really cared about the fate of the hungarian minority in transcarpathia oblast, she would be interested in

helping ukraine as much as possible, to help the hungarian minority as well, to help ukraine win. moreover, imagine the situation that could develop in the first weeks of a full-scale invasion, imagine that ukraine would then suffer a serious defeat, does anyone seriously think that if russia dominated ukraine, if there was a russian puppet government in ukraine, something like yanukovych number two, it would be good for the hungarian ethnic minority. does anyone seriously think that russia would not suppress all ethnic minorities belonging to eu and nato countries. no one will say so, and yet budapest refrained from providing military aid. even

more so in conditional issues, educational rights, in what was the key source of disagreement. ukraine and hungary, tensions have existed for 7-8 years, which is difficult to answer. nevertheless, for several years, there was no noticeable constructive approach from the hungarian and ukrainian sides. the budapest government has shown no willingness to solve problems. thus, for several years in bilateral relations there was a stalemate. orban will change something in kyiv. this meeting has been planned for years. orbán has been constantly invited by president zelenskyi for many years, and now the two leaders

have met in person. we hope that this will become a catalyst for the normalization of bilateral relations. recently, there have been certain gestures, both from the hungarian side and from the ukrainian side. when it comes to technical details. to languages, education systems, educational rights, cultural rights and all these things. in the long term, i am optimistic, also because after this meeting, the head of zakarpattia oblast viktor mykyta announced that there is a plan to organize a ukrainian-hungarian business forum to discuss hungary's contribution to the recovery of ukraine and hungarian investments. and when money is on the table, they usually have restraint. influencing the debate when we 're talking about economics, when we're talking about money, it's always a more rational thing than when we're talking about more symbolic political issues. despite the fact that orban's visit to

moscow obviously came as a surprise to kyiv, the ukrainian reaction was very restrained, moderate, wise and not escalating at all. this again is some indication that there is a chance for the relationship to improve, despite the fact that several years have been lost. i hope the future will look a little better, and one more thing: the meeting between zelenskyi and orban was organized literally in 5 days. organizing a meeting of such a high level, in such a short time, is possible only when both parties really want it to take place. in this case, both parties really wanted to the meeting took place, and this is again a good sign that ukraine and hungary are now ready to overcome some difficult issues and move forward.

hungary's viktor orbán constantly praises the potential future president of the united states , donald trump, and donald trump speaks well of orbán. two weeks ago , during his visit to the nato summit in washington , orbán even visited florida and met with donald trump in maralago. how dangerous can this tandem be if donald trump wins the elections in in november this tandem expression is actually interesting. calling them a tandem. we indicate that they have equal power but that's not exactly the case, but ok let's call them a tandem, whatever you want to call them, it's kind of like

a one-sided love affair, or something like that, i'm not very good at soap bars, but i'm sure we can find a name. it is interesting that hungarian diplomacy 100% supported donald trump. hungary's ambassador to washington, sábolcs takács, said that budapest has no plan b. he undertook support trump. if trump does not win, then hungary does not count on any good relations with its united states. for smaller countries, the usual strategy is to have good relations with both parties. even for a medium-

sized, medium-sized country like ukraine, the ukrainian diplomatic corps in washington, led by ambassador oksana markarova, has excellent connections with the democratic camp and several republican politicians. a strategy for how countries feel about the current presidential race. you have good ones relations with both sides, and you delegate highly trained professional diplomats as ambassadors, such as ambassador markarov from the ukrainian side, or ambassador takacs from the hungarian side. however, hungary fully supports the republicans this time, which is very unusual. if trump wins, budapest won't get much, don't overestimate hungary's importance to... also, hungary's close relationship with china will be a problem for the incoming trump administration, i think

a big problem. even a close relationship hungary with russia is not necessarily going to be helpful, so even if trump wins, even if the hungarian bid wins, i'm not sure it can bring any strategic benefits to hungary. meanwhile, if a democratic president leaves the race, hungarian-american relations will further deteriorate. of course, i said this would be the last question, but if you don't... i 'll ask one more: how strong is viktor orbán's position in hungary, and how long is he going to stay as prime minister of that country. at least until 2026, the following parliamentary elections are scheduled for 2026. if mr. orbán is healthy and continues to serve as prime minister, there is no scenario in which he could lose his power before 2026. which

will happen in 2026, well, the parliamentary elections are still very, very far away. thank you mr. ratz for joining us today and thank you very much for your answers, i really appreciate it, it was andra schratz, a hungarian security analyst, an expert at the german council on foreign relations, and also a lecturer at corvina university spoke to him on serious questions with... in particular, about hungary, about its leader viktor orbán, as well as about such sensitive hungarian-ukrainian relations, well, what's next, the conversation was interesting, the answers were interesting, i think you will like it, well, i'll stop there to say goodbye to you, my name is yuriy fizar, see you soon.

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