The European Union is running out of patience with Hungary.
The “level of frustration” of the Member States with the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, and his blocking of the financial lifeline to keep afloat Ukraine, which has been resisting Russian aggression for almost two years, has greatly increased.
This is clearly stated by several diplomatic sources.
In a key week for kyiv, several leaders are issuing what could be the last warning to Hungary to give way on Thursday, at a European summit called to address this issue, to the approval of 50 billion euros over four years for Ukraine within the community budget.
Brussels pressures and negotiates.
Budapest, which this Monday showed signs that – with conditions and concessions – it could accept an agreement, at the same time criticizes the “blackmail” of the EU.
The accusation is mutual.
Several capitals are already talking about extraordinary measures against Budapest if it maintains the blockade on funds for Ukraine and the policy of coercion that has already become its hallmark.
Orbán has insisted on linking his decision with the release of the European funds that Brussels keeps withheld for its violations of the rule of law: in December, on the eve of the European summit in which key issues for Ukraine were discussed, the Commission unfrozen 10.2 billion to Hungary, but kept 21 billion withheld.
In the midst of the negotiations on the financial lifeline for Ukraine, in which the tone with Hungary has been increasingly harsh, there has been talk of keeping those 21 billion withheld from Budapest.
Or to skip Hungary's turn to preside over the Council of the EU – which must begin in July, until December – and go directly to Poland, the next member state on the list.
But that is a difficult and purely symbolic process.
Furthermore, some Member States believe that it is time to seriously put on the table the debate of restarting the process against Hungary for violations of the rule of law, which could result in the EU's most fractious and Russia-friendly partner losing its rights. of vote.
But that decision requires unanimity and that is also difficult.
The time has not come to press the red button, launch a high community source.
“For several member states, support for Ukraine is a question of existentialism, survival and strategy,” the source emphasizes.
“Now there are more capitals that want to be tougher on Orbán, but there is still room for maneuver,” she adds.
For now, if there is no agreement, we will try to make it clear that Hungary is a completely isolated country: Twenty-six partners against one.
And that would have not only political but economic effects, for example towards the credibility of the country, says a European diplomat.
Meanwhile, an internal analysis document of the European Council on the Hungarian economy, which describes its very high dependence on community funds, the serious problems it would face if it cannot access them, and which indicates the option for leaders to speak publicly about the The possibility of withholding funds if there is no deal on Ukraine on Thursday – something that would scare away investors – has added fuel to an already acrimonious debate.
Budapest has branded the note, reported by the
Financial Times
newspaper and which EL PAÍS has been able to see, as evidence that the EU wants to sabotage it.
Sources from the European Council deny that the note, of just over one page, outlines an action plan towards Hungary.
“The document, drawn up by Brussels bureaucrats, only confirms what the Hungarian Government has been saying for a long time: that access to EU funds is used for political blackmail by Brussels,” its minister launched. of European Affairs, Janos Boka, on social networks.
“Some member states are finally waking up,” says Daniel Freund, a Green MEP and one of the most critical of Hungary's violations of the rule of law.
“The withdrawal of voting rights and the freezing of all funds are the EU's sharpest swords,” says the MEP, who believes that the signals from Brussels about the blackmail of the Hungarian vote are “clear”, but who maintains that should not be used in connection with breaking the Hungarian veto over Ukraine, but rather for what they are designed for: its non-compliance.
This Monday, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó traveled to kyiv for the first time since the start of the war with Russia.
As announced by his Ukrainian counterpart, Dmitro Kuleba, both agreed to create a bilateral commission to resolve, within a period of 10 days, the disagreements of both parties on the issue of the Hungarian minority in Ukraine.
kyiv hopes that the meeting held in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhhorod will help break Hungarian resistance to approving the European aid package.
Emergency brake for aid to kyiv
Hungary did not accept in December – when it did give the green light to open accession talks with Ukraine – a broader review of the multiannual financial framework to create a special allocation of 50 billion for Ukraine, in addition to other funds for immigration and competition.
Orbán, close to the Russian Vladimir Putin, with whom he continues to do business, has refused to allow the financial lifeline for kyiv to come from the community budget.
Doing it outside that framework would make the process difficult and slow down, according to the other 26 partners.
As a condition of accepting the formula, Budapest wants there to be a year-by-year review of the funds being sent - or some kind of emergency brake - and to add more community funds for surveillance of the EU's external borders, in addition to some kind of clause giving more time to Member States to spend the funds allocated for the recovery fund (now it is until 2026).
This measure would benefit you if you manage to meet the requirements to receive it.
The negotiation now focuses on that emergency brake that could satisfy Budapest without giving it the ability to veto aid for kyiv year after year.
There is no longer pending on the leaders' table any political gesture - forceful and with serious implications - such as the one made in December with the opening of accession negotiations with Ukraine.
Now it's about keeping Ukraine alive in its war against Russia.
Those 50 billion euros for four years mean that the Ukrainian State has the possibility of continuing to function and not collapse, giving victory to Putin.
And that, explains another diplomatic source, is the point that explains why the level of satiety has now risen so much.
Without European funds, Ukraine could have to leave two million civil servants without salaries, according to an internal document published by EL PAÍS in December.
European leaders are reluctant to put on the table a plan B to send funds to Ukraine without remedy.
There is the option of doing it without Hungary, community sources acknowledge, but several member states would need the approval of their parliaments and that would slow it down and make it difficult.
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