Salvador Martínez Mas Berlin

Berlin

Updated Monday, March 11, 2024-15:55

  • European Union The EU renounces appeasement and threatens to go into a total clash with Hungary

Viktor Orban enjoys such closeness with Donald Trump, former US president and Republican presidential candidate, that on his last visit to the United States, the Hungarian prime minister did not go to American soil to meet with the current tenant of the White House,

Joe Biden.

Orban traveled across the Atlantic Ocean to meet and participate as a guest at an event at Trump's Mar-a-Lago mansion in Florida.

Back on the 'old continent', the message that Orban brings is the following:

"Trump is the president of peace

. "

On how to end the war of aggression that Russia is waging against Ukraine, which has just completed two years, Orban said in an interview with Hungarian television

M1

on Sunday that Trump has

"very detailed plans"

on how to end this conflict. .

These plans apparently involve breaking with the current Western strategy of supporting Kiev against the invading Russian forces.

"He has a very clear vision, with which it is very difficult to disagree," Orban explained.

"In the Ukraine-Russia war, he will not contribute a single penny

. That is why the war will end, since it is obvious that Ukraine cannot stand alone. If the Americans do not give money or weapons (...) then the war will be over," said the Hungarian Prime Minister.

Faced with a possible withdrawal of US support for

Volodimir Zelensky

with a future arrival of Trump to the White House, it will not be because of Orban that Europe will compensate for the US abandonment of Ukraine.

"If the Americans do not give money, the Europeans alone will be incapable of financing this war. And thus the war ends," stated the Hungarian in his interview with

M1.

Part of Orban's conviction that Trump will mean geopolitical appeasement in Europe has to do with the fact that, in the past, "Donald Trump was a president of peace," according to the Hungarian prime minister on his social networks.

It could not be clearer from them which candidate in this year's US presidential election he supports.

"During his presidency there was peace in the Middle East and peace in Ukraine.

If he had continued as president of the United States, there would still be peace today

," Orban stated through his social networks in his message of gratitude to Trump for his invitation to his mansion. on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean.

"We need leaders in the world who are respected and who can bring peace. He is one of them. Come and bring us peace, Mr. President," the

premier

went so far as to say .

Orban, flattered by Trump

At Mar-a-Lago, Orban allowed himself to be flattered by Trump, according to public videos of the visit.

In his well-known hyperbolic tone, the now Republican candidate to be the 47th president of the United States stated that there was

"no one better, smarter or better leader than Viktor Orban

. "

Trump even joked that Orban is a leader who "doesn't generate controversy" because he "says how things are and that's it."

Those words, although they may be applied to the internal political debate in Hungary, a country whose National Assembly is dominated by the Hungarian Civic Alliance (Fidesz), Orban's party, and its allies in the Christian Democratic People's Party (DKNP), have no reflection in Europe. .

What's more,

Orban figures as the greatest European ally of Russian President

Vladimir Putin.

The last meeting between the Hungarian and Putin dates back to last autumn, when both met in Beijing to participate in an international meeting in favor of China's Belt and Road initiative.

These types of meetings partly explain Budapest's lack of harmony with the majority sentiment in Europe, where the main capitals have come to consider Russia a geopolitical threat to the continent.

Thus, it is not surprising that Orban's Hungary

is at the bottom in terms of solidarity with Ukraine.

According to data from the Institute for the World Economy (IfW) in Kiel, a German organization that is dedicated, among other things, to recording announcements of international aid to Ukraine at a military, financial and humanitarian level,

Hungary has barely dedicated 0.03 % of your GDP in your aid

.

Orban's country represents a scant 0.7% of the total aid that the European Union has sent to Ukraine, valued at almost 85 million euros according to the IfW.

The EU leads the classification of aid prepared by the Kiel organization, although the United States far exceeds the military support provided by European institutions, reaching 41.2 billion.

The European country that has provided the most military support to Ukraine is Germany, with 17.2 billion euros, according to IfW accounts, whose latest data collects information from the beginning of the invasion until mid-January of this year.