"We can only support Ukraine's further integration rapprochement, when the rights of the Hungarian national community in Ukraine are restored", according to István Jakab.Continue reading
Hungary’s behavior as a NATO member state is “fortunately” not up to the Ukrainian President, stated the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Péter Szijjártó wrote this on his Facebook page in response to Volodymyr Zelensky’s statement earlier that “Hungary’s behavior as a NATO member state is not appropriate”.
The Hungarian people have already paid an extremely high price for the war in Ukraine. Many Hungarians – members of the Hungarian community in Transcarpathia – have already died in this war, the Minister stressed.
He added that if this statement means that the Ukrainian president respectfully thanks the Hungarians for “letting in and taking care of more than a million refugees from Ukraine” and respectfully thanks them for “sending aid on a continuous basis”, then “they are welcome and can count on us in the future”, Péter Szijjártó wrote on his Facebook page.
In interviews with Finnish, Swedish, Danish and Norwegian journalists over the weekend, Volodymyr Zelensky speculated that Hungary’s behavior and relations with Russia were not in line with the country’s status as a NATO ally. “It is a very strange situation: can a NATO country be on the side of Russia and against NATO?” the Ukrainian news portal European Pravda quoted Zelensky as saying.
According to the Ukrainian President, a NATO ally cannot be on the side of Russia, which sees NATO as an enemy. “I think that this is inappropriate behavior,” he said, stressing that he was merely expressing “his own subjective opinion”.
Zelensky said that if all allies say that Russia calls Ukraine enemy and that Russia should be put in its place, then one state cannot say no and say that Russia is an ally for them. “This is impossible, it means that that country is not an ally of NATO. And if it is a de jure ally but de facto works against the alliance, then it should not advise Ukraine whether to join NATO or not,” Zelensky said, stressing that an ally should not put obstacles in the way of Ukraine’s NATO membership.
Featured photo via European Parliament
