EU leaders on Friday pledged to find a way around Hungary’s veto on a 50 billion euro (US$54.54 billion) aid package for Ukraine, after Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban blocked the desperately needed support.
The 27 leaders are to reconvene for an emergency summit early next year to try to hammer out a deal after intense wrangling at a two-day meeting in Brussels failed to budge Orban.
The failure to commit more aid to prop up Ukraine’s budget over the next four years dealt a blow to Kyiv, even after the bloc took the symbolic step of agreeing to open membership talks.
Photo: Reuters
“We expect all the necessary legal procedures to be completed in January 2024, which will allow us to receive the relevant funding as soon as possible,” the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he was “reasonably optimistic” that an agreement could be reached with Orban at the next summit.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen vowed that her office would use the time to ensure there is an “operational solution” to Orban’s veto “whatever happens.”
That could mean the other 26 EU countries that back giving the aid to Kyiv could club together without Hungary to come up with the aid outside the bloc’s budget.
“We are working very hard, of course to have a result where there is an agreement of 27 member states,” Von der Leyen said. “But I think it is now also necessary to work on potential alternatives.”
Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said that “it looks like we’ll just have to regroup next year, and come to an agreement then, or do a workaround.”
Orban, in an interview with Hungarian state radio, linked the planned EU money for Ukraine to tens of billions of euros that Brussels has frozen for Hungary because of democratic backsliding and corruption concerns.
“This is a great opportunity for Hungary to make it clear that it should get what it deserves,” Orban said. “We want to be treated fairly, and now there is a good chance that we can assert this.”
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