BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Hungary would back granting long-term financial aid to Ukraine outside of the European Union budget, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Thursday, while reiterating his opposition to start accession talks with Kyiv.
Orban spoke on arriving to a summit of EU leaders, where all other EU countries want to provide Ukraine with 50 billion euros in budget support through 2027 and advance Kyiv’s membership bid as the country’s war with Russia drags on.
Orban said there was no time pressure to decide on more financial aid to Ukraine because short-term support was already secured. For longer-term backing, he said it needed to be fixed outside of the bloc’s joint coffers.
He also said Ukraine had met 3 out of the 7 conditions the EU had set to launch accession negotiations.
“We have to come back to this issue again, revert when it’s fulfilled by the Ukrainians,” Orban said. “We are not in a position to start to negotiate.”
Speaking on Wednesday, the EU’s chief executive said reforms passed in Ukraine last week meant Kyiv now met 6 out of those 7 conditions, with the only outstanding requirement being a new law on lobbying to limit oligarchs’ influence in the country.
(Reporting by Krisztina Than, Bart Meijer, Writing by Gabriela Baczynska, Editing by Charlotte Van Campenhout)
