Orban visits Macron before the EU summit: Media reports say Paris sees opportunity to convince Budapest of Ukraine's accession
Kyiv • UNN
Hungarian Prime Minister Orban will meet with President Macron in Paris to discuss EU issues, potentially questioning Ukraine's EU membership application and financial aid plans due to his ties to Moscow and tactical bargaining for more EU funding.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban will meet with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris on Thursday, his press service chief said, ahead of an EU summit where talks on Ukraine's accession to the bloc and financial aid to Kyiv are expected to meet resistance from Orban, UNN reports citing Reuters.
Details
Politico reports, citing a Paris-based official, that French President Emmanuel Macron has invited Orban to meet with him in Paris later this week to find a compromise, as Paris believes the Hungarian leader can still be persuaded to support Ukraine's accession, The official said Orban was "raising the stakes" in the game to get more EU money. "This is purely tactical... so there is some optimism that we can reach an agreement," he said.
Related
Orban recently demanded that the leaders' summit take no decisions on giving Ukraine the green light for membership talks and adopting a budget plan that includes 50 billion euros for economic support for Ukraine.
Orban, who has maintained ties with Moscow even though the EU has imposed sanctions on Russia over its war in Ukraine, is at odds with the European Commission, the newspaper said.
Any decision to negotiate accession requires the unanimous support of EU leaders.
