2024-07-26 12:45:36
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán bet on Donald Trump in the US election campaign and openly supports him. If the former president does not win in November, relations between Budapest and Washington will be frosty, says Hungarian political commentator Gábor Györi in an interview for Aktuálně.cz.
Before 2010, Györi worked as an analyst in the office of the Hungarian Prime Minister (Viktor Orbán is the head of the government from 2010 to the present). He now works at the Budapest-based Policy Solutions research center, which advocates liberal democracy and European integration.
According to him, Orbán deduces from bad historical experiences with Russia that Hungary should get along well with the Kremlin because of its power. “Personally, I was really surprised by how many Hungarians and how quickly they identified with it,” says the man, who is one of the long-time critics of the Hungarian prime minister.
Viktor Orbán visited Kyiv and Moscow shortly after the beginning of the Hungarian presidency of the European Union, and then he spoke with Donald Trump in Florida. There is speculation that he is playing some kind of high diplomatic game and that he is a courier or intermediary between Vladimir Putin and Trump. Possible?
We don’t know if he is actually anything like that because he won’t say. And since Orbán and people around him give interviews only to friendly media, from whom they do not expect criticism and real questions, we will not even know. Official government communication in Hungary is also not transparent.
In my opinion, Orbán is primarily trying to convince the domestic audience, the Hungarian voters, that he is an important international player. And that it implements an independent policy, different from the European Union. After all, he himself said that he did not need approval from anyone from the European Union for his trips, and therefore he did not tell anyone in advance about his trip to Moscow.
I do not believe that Orbán could be a key figure in the negotiation of peace between Ukraine and Russia, but of course I could be wrong. He is interested in maintaining good relations with Putin.
Gábor Györi. | Photo: Archive of Gábor Györi
Why does he actually insist on good relations with Putin and Russia, despite Hungary’s isolation in the European Union and NATO?
Officially, it emphasizes that it is about energy and that Hungary is dependent on Russian oil and gas, but, unlike other European countries, it does not do much to reduce this dependence. And it is also related to his belief that the West is in a kind of decline, that the European Union is in decline and that, on the contrary, the East is on the rise. Specifically, they mean China and Russia. He considers Russia to be better prepared for the 21st century than the European Union.
As for the United States, Orbán says quite frankly that he prefers Donald Trump as president. Everything seems to be betting on one card…
He is consistent in that. Already in 2016, he was the only European statesman who absolutely clearly expressed his support for Trump. Actually, your then president Miloš Zeman behaved similarly. Under Trump, the American ambassador had very good relations with Viktor Orbán, after the victory of Joe Biden in 2020, the exact opposite happened. Orbán clearly hopes that Trump will be president again. If not, Hungary’s relations with the US will fall very low under the new democratic administration.
It is curious that Orbán comments on American politics and shows support for a particular candidate, but when someone does this to Hungary, he considers it to be meddling in the country’s internal affairs. When a foreign politician expresses support for the opposition, he calls it unacceptable.
Does the Hungarian opposition have a chance to win the next parliamentary elections in 2026?
It has heavy access to the media, the government has a lot more resources at its disposal that it uses. It is and will be very difficult to win in such a situation.
In the Czech Republic, the question is sometimes raised as to why the Hungarians are not more afraid of Russia and its imperial ambitions. Have they forgotten the year 1956, when Soviet troops suppressed the Hungarian uprising?
It is not only about the year 1956, but also about the revolution in 1848, which Vienna would not have suppressed without Russian help. But otherwise I agree and I must say that I am also surprised that there is not more criticism of Russia in our country. But Orbán takes it as the bad historical experience with Russia and its power should lead us to get along well with it. That we should not provoke him and should not allow ourselves to be drawn into the war in Ukraine in any way. He managed to convince a large part of Hungarian society in this direction. I was personally really surprised by how many Hungarians and how quickly they identified with it.
In the past, the Hungarian right was critical of Russia and warned against it, today its approach is the opposite. And Orbán constantly repeats that the West and Ukraine are to blame for the war because they provoked Russia.
Video: People don’t realize where Orbán is leading Hungary, says a journalist
Orbán’s strategy to negotiate an exemption for Hungary on Russian gas has caught up with him. We buy at higher prices than those on the stock exchange. However, the Hungarians do not realize this. | Video: Michael Rozsypal