Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban announced, at dawn on Friday, that he used his veto power at the European Union summit in Brussels to prevent the approval of European aid to Ukraine worth 50 billion euros in loans and donations.
“Summary of the night session: Veto on additional funds for Ukraine, and Veto on multi-year European budget review,” Orban wrote on the X platform.
He added: “We will return to this issue next year after appropriate preparations.”
26 of the 27 EU countries agreed to grant Ukraine a package of loans and grants over a period of four years with a total value of 50 billion euros, but Hungary’s rejection of this package was enough to abort it.
Following Orban’s post, European Council President Charles Michel announced that European Union countries would resume negotiations “early next year” on providing new aid to Ukraine.
Michel told reporters, “I do not want to delve too much into the details. I will work in the coming days and weeks with my colleagues to prepare for a summit at the beginning of next year.”
In turn, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said, “We have reached an agreement among 26 countries. There is no agreement on the part of Hungary at the present time, but I am very confident about next year.”
The decision of Orban, the Kremlin’s best friend in the European Union, represents a setback for Ukraine and its supporters alike, especially since it came after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his allies continued to exchange congratulations on the success of the European summit in opening negotiations for Ukraine’s accession to the bloc.
The decisions of the European Summit are issued unanimously, giving each of its 27 countries the right to veto.
Orban also opposed opening negotiations for Ukraine’s accession to the Union, but this time he did not use his veto against him, but rather agreed to a compromise solution that required him to leave the hall during the vote and pass the resolution next without voting with or against him.
“Dissatisfaction” with the meeting between the Prime Minister of Hungary and Putin in China
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has become the first Western leader to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin since the International Criminal Court indicted the resident of the Kremlin Palace for war crimes, according to the British newspaper, the Financial Times.
Western countries criticized Orban for many of his positions that were in one way or another supportive of Putin since his large-scale invasion of Ukraine, especially by delaying sanctions, refusing to provide military assistance to Kiev, and objecting to its accession to the European Union.
Recently, Kiev has been doing its utmost to convince the world that support for its Western allies is not diminishing, at a time when doubts are growing about continued American support for the Ukrainian war effort.
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2023-12-15 03:56:11
