Péter Szijjártó, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade, said the best chance of ending the war in Ukraine is if the European Parliament take a turn rightwards and if Donald Trump is re-elected as US president.
Speaking at a campaign event near Budapest on Monday, the foreign minister said the chances of ending the war in short order appeared slim for now, partly because the majority of European political leaders were in a state of “war psychosis”. No one had attacked the European Union, any European country or NATO, he said, warning that Western responses may end up risking escalation and a third world war. It was “appalling”, he added, that some European leaders had even brought up the use of nuclear weapons. No solution on the battlefield existed, the minister said, adding that a settlement could only be reached through diplomacy. “If Donald Trump wins and there is a right-wing turn in the European Parliament elections on June 9, nothing right now offers a better chance of ending the war,” he said. Meanwhile, he said Hungary’s media were “the freest in Europe” as well as the most diverse. Addressing Hungary’s child protection law, he said that in Brussels it was “a capital crime” for anyone to state that a family consists of “a father, mother and children and that the father is a man and the mother is a woman”. He added that Hungary was not receiving EU funds because of its stance on the matter. Minister Szijjártó said Brussels was seriously breaking the law. “Someone must take responsibility for the fact that tens of billions of euros have not arrived for the development of Hungary,” he said. Even so, Hungary had proven its economic viability without EU funds, he said. Regarding relations with China, the minister said European countries were in fierce competition with each other for investments from China, especially as regards the electric car industry, and Chinese batteries were needed for German electric cars. “This is what the transition of the European green car industry looks like right now,” he said.