With the loosening of the fiscal constraints the EU puts on budgetary spending of member states, the European Commission believes that an additional EUR 650 bln (USD 702 bln) could be freed up for defense spending.
The European Council had called the emergency summit to discuss European defense and continued support for Ukraine in light of U.S. President Donald Trump’s sudden withdrawal of financial and military aid to Ukraine (since restored), potentially leaving Europe to fend for itself.
While Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said that Hungary should participate in common European defense policy and contribute funds to it, he did not agree with the prospect of joint borrowing. For approval, the proposal requires a qualified majority, the backing of at least 15 of the EU’s 27 member states (representing at least 65% of the bloc’s population), so Hungary alone cannot veto the plan.
Speaking on the sidelines of the summit, Orbán said that the majority of European leaders were arguing that the war should continue, with Europe assuming not only its existing commitments to Ukraine but also financial and military support previously provided by the United States.
After the summit, Orbán told Kossuth Rádió that EU plans to fill the gap left by apparent cuts to American support for Kyiv would damage the bloc’s economy, adding that EU membership for Ukraine would mean “Europe will be destroyed, including the Hungarian economy. We are not prepared for this, and so I believe that it must be slowed down, and we must find out the people’s opinion about this issue under any circumstances,” he said.
Consequently, Orbán said his government would initiate a referendum on Ukraine’s European Union membership, putting the question to the Hungarian public “quickly and simply” in the format of previous national consultations. Pollsters and opposition parties have widely criticized such surveys as propaganda tools that are manipulative in their phrasing and highly suggestive of desired answers.
Supporting Ukraine’s goal of joining the European Union, one such opposition party, the leftist Democratic Coalition (DK), said it would initiate its own national referendum on the matter, the party’s MEP Klára Dobrev (the wife of DK’s leader, former Socialist Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány) said.
DK’s proposed referendum question would be: “Do you support Ukraine becoming a member of the European Union if it fulfills all accession requirements?” Dobrev added that Hungary’s right-wing is exploiting Ukraine’s accession bid for domestic political purposes rather than genuinely seeking public opinion.
Meanwhile, oil deliveries to Hungary through the Druzhba [Friendship] pipeline had temporarily been suspended following a Ukrainian drone strike on one of the pipeline’s measuring stations on March 11, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó said. Szijjártó was informed of the drone strike by Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister in Charge of Energy Affairs Alexander Novak, while Russia’s First Deputy Energy Minister Pavel Sorokin later informed Szijjártó that the Russian operator had completed repairs and resumed oil deliveries to Hungary.
“We call on the Ukrainians not to attack the infrastructure supplying energy to Hungary,” the foreign minister said, especially since Hungary was Ukraine’s principal electricity supplier last year, accounting for 39% of the war-torn country’s electricity imports. In February alone, Hungary provided 35% of Ukraine’s imported electricity, while 42% of Ukraine’s natural gas imports also passed through Hungary.
Following a meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels on March 17, Szijjártó said that Hungary would “naturally” continue to export electricity and natural gas to Ukraine but, in return, would legitimately expect that Ukraine would not endanger Hungary’s energy supplies. “We will, of course, maintain those deliveries; we don’t want to cause even more hardship for the Ukrainian people,” Szijjártó insisted.
This article was first published in the Budapest Business Journal print issue of March 21, 2025.
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