BUDAPEST: Donald Trump’s biggest European fan, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, predicted on Friday that a new US administration under Trump will cease providing support to Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s full-scale invasion.
Orbán’s comments were a signal that Trump’s recent election could drive a wedge among European Union leaders on the question of the war.
Hungary’s leader hosted the second of two days of summits on Friday in the capital, Budapest, just days after Trump’s election victory. The war in Ukraine was high on the agenda for the gathering of the EU’s 27 leaders, most of whom believe continuing to supply Kyiv with weapons and financial assistance are key elements for the continent’s security.
The nationalist Hungarian leader has long sought to undermine EU support for Ukraine, and routinely blocked, delayed or watered down the bloc’s efforts to provide weapons and funding and to sanction Moscow for its invasion. He has sought to use the summits to make his case to other leaders that they should rethink their commitments to the war-ravaged country.
In comments to state radio before Friday’s summit, Orbán, who is considered close to both Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, reiterated his long-held position that an immediate ceasefire should be declared, and suggested that Ukraine has already lost its fight.
“The situation on the front is obvious, there’s been a military defeat. The Americans are going to pull out of this war,” Orbán said.
The Hungarian leader has cast himself as the exemplar of some in the EU who are skeptical of providing indefinite support to Ukraine, especially in light of uncertainty over whether US assistance could evaporate under Trump.
He said Friday that Trump’s reelection had created a “new situation” for Europe, and that the continent “cannot finance this war alone.”
But numerous EU leaders made a point to downplay the risk of a shift in US policies drifting across the Atlantic into European capitals. Arriving at the summit, the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said a new US administration wouldn’t lead Europe to change course.
“We cannot outsource our capacity of action. Whatever happens in the US, we have our interests, we have our values,” Borrell said.
Italy’s hard-right leader, Premier Giorgia Meloni, who is aligned with Orbán on many issues but breaks with him sharply on Russia’s war, said: “As long is there is a war, Italy is on the side of Ukraine.”
Western support is crucial for Kyiv to sustain the costly war of attrition, but Trump’s repeated statements criticizing US aid, and his claims that he could bring the conflict to a rapid end, have led to uncertainty over how long the help will continue.
At a gathering on Thursday of European leaders in Budapest, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky objected to Trump’s claim that Russia’s war with Ukraine could be ended in a day, something he and his European backers fear would mean peace on terms favorable to Putin and involving the surrender of territory.
“If it is going to be very fast, it will be a loss for Ukraine,” Zelensky said.
Despite Orbán’s attempts to throttle aid packages, EU leaders have largely found workaround solutions to any obstruction to providing Zelensky with assistance, and have been able to signal their commitment to supporting Ukraine in its fight, regardless of who occupies the White House.
Closing out the summit on Friday, European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen said the EU would “discuss with our American friends also the fact that Russia is not only a threat to Europe, but a threat to the global security as a whole” in an effort to dissuade a new Trump administration from abandoning aid to Ukraine.
“We see that technology from China and Iran is used by Russia on the battlefield,” she continued. “It shows that the security of the Indo-Pacific and Europe are interconnected, and so are the European and the United States interests in this course.”
Hungary PM Orban says Europe cannot finance Ukraine war alone
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Hungary PM Orban says Europe cannot finance Ukraine war alone
- Viktor Orban: ‘The Americans will quit this war, first of all they will not encourage the war’
Greek coast guard search for 15 after migrant boat found adrift
- The two survivors reported that the vessel had become unstable due to bad weather and there was no means of getting shelter, food or water
ATHENS: Greek coast guard were on Monday searching for 15 people who fell into the water from a migrant boat that was found drifting off the coast of Crete with 17 bodies on board.
The 17 fatalities, all of them men, were discovered on Saturday on the craft, which was taking on water and partially deflated, some 26 nautical miles (48 kilometers) southwest of the island.
Post-mortem examinations were being carried out to determine how they died but Greek public television channel ERT suggested they may have suffered from hypothermia or dehydration.
A Greek coast guard spokeswoman told AFP that two survivors reported that “15 people fell in the water” after the motor cut out on Thursday, then the vessel drifted for two days.
At the time, Crete and much of the rest of Greece was battered by heavy rain and storms.
The two survivors reported that the vessel had become unstable due to bad weather and there was no means of getting shelter, food or water.
The vessel had 34 people on board and had left the Libyan port of Tobruk on Wednesday, the Greek port authorities said. Most of those who died came from Sudan and Egypt.
It was initially spotted by a Turkish-flagged cargo ship on Saturday, triggering a search that included ships and aircraft from the Greek coast guard and the European Union border agency Frontex.
Migrants have been trying to reach Crete from Libya for the last year, as a way of entering the European Union. But the Mediterranean crossing is perilous.
In Brussels, the EU’s 27 members on Monday backed a significant tightening of immigration policy, including the concept of returning failed asylum-seekers to “return hubs” outside the bloc.
The UN refugee agency said more than 16,770 asylum seekers in the EU have arrived on Crete since the start of the year — more than any other island in the Aegean Sea.
Greece’s conservative government has also toughened its migration policy, suspending asylum claims for three months, particularly those coming to Crete from Libya.
