Hungary's Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto addresses the audience as he stands behind the original Washington Treaty during a ceremony to mark the 75th anniversary of NATO at NATO headquarters in Brussels, on April 4.Geert Vanden Wijngaert/The Associated Press
Hungary will not participate in NATO’s long-term plan to aid Ukraine, its foreign minister said on Wednesday, calling the plan a “crazy mission”.
NATO allies agreed in April to initiate planning on long-term military support for Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, through setting up a fund worth €100-billion ($147.5-billion).
Under the plans, NATO would take over some co-ordination work from a U.S.-led coalition known as the Ramstein group.
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto reiterated the government’s earlier opposition to the plan.
“Hungary will stay out of NATO’s crazy mission despite all the pressure,” he told a Facebook-live event in London.
Government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs, responding to NATO’s initiative last month, said on X that Hungary would back no NATO proposals that “might draw the alliance closer to war or shift it from a defensive to an offensive coalition.”
Relations between Budapest and NATO have soured because of Hungary’s foot-dragging over the ratification of Sweden’s NATO accession – finally passed by Budapest in March – and also over nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s warm ties with Moscow despite the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The U.S. envoy to Hungary said earlier that NATO allies are warning Hungary of the dangers of its “close and expanding” relationship with Russia and if this is Budapest’s policy choice “we will have to decide how best to protect our security interests,” David Pressman said.