Hungary’s prime minister said Ukraine was “light years” away from joining the European Union (EU) in his comments on Saturday.
According to the Associated Press, Viktor Orbán told his party’s biannual congress that he and his government would oppose December talks on whether Ukraine should be invited to start accession negotiations.
“Our task will be to correct the false promise to start negotiations with Ukraine, since Ukraine is now light years away from the European Union,” Orbán said, according to the AP.
Orbán has threatened to withdraw support from Ukraine because of its history of waging an ongoing war with Russia over its treatment of ethnic Hungarians. He told MPs he was protesting a 2017 law banning Hungarians from speaking their language and said Hungary would not support Ukraine on international issues “until the previous laws are restored” in September.
He added that “Hungary is doing everything for peace in the war between Ukraine and Russia.”
“But unfortunately the Russian-Ukrainian war continues, tens of thousands of people are victims,” he said, according to transcripts of the speech carried by Hungarian media. “Diplomats must take back control from the hands of soldiers, otherwise it will be in vain for women to wait for their sons, fathers and husbands to return home.”
Orbán is also one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s only allies in the EU. He also said that negotiations on Ukraine’s admission to the EU should not begin when the country is at war.
The Associated Press contributed.
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