Neither the White House nor NATO seems to be particularly happy with Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his three-hour meeting yesterday with Vladimir Putin in Moscow. “So we’re concerned that Prime Minister Orbán would choose to take this trip to Moscow, which will neither advance the cause of peace nor will it promote Ukraine’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, and independence,” a senior administration official told a White House press briefing. “Look, at the end of the day, we believe that Russia could end this war today by ceasing its aggression against Ukraine.”
In Brussels, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg went out of his way to portray Orbán as being in full agreement with the NATO narrative that Russia is the aggressor and solely responsible for the war. But, then, a reporter interjected: “Viktor Orbán does not regularly state that Russia is the aggressor. He in fact says that the war is being propagated now by continuing to aid Ukraine and that is one of the reasons you had to make this deal with him that Hungary is not in favor of, of aiding Ukraine. So what kind of message does this send? And was Viktor Orbán one of the reasons why you could not get a multi-year commitment on your hoped-for package for Ukraine? But the main point is, Viktor Orbán does not seem to share your message.”
