Hungarian PM Orban: Trump Can be a Broker for Russia-Ukraine Peace: He Has Detailed Plan

Hungarian PM Viktor Orban. (Wikimedia Commons/Vlada Republie Slovenije/Bor Slana)

JAKARTA - Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said in a letter to European Union leaders that Republican U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump is ready to act "immediately" as a peace broker in the Russia-Ukraine war if he is elected in November.

The letter, addressed to European Council President Charles Michel and distributed to all EU leaders, was drafted after PM Orban held talks with Trump as well as with the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, and China.

"I can confidently state that immediately after his election victory, he will not wait until his inauguration, (Trump) will be ready to act as a peace broker immediately. He has detailed and well-founded plans for this," PM Orban wrote, as reported by Reuters on July 16.

Trump, who is also a former president, will again compete with incumbent Joe Biden from the Democratic Party, in a presidential election that is a 'repeat' of the 2020 election battle.

PM Orban, who is a long-time supporter of Trump, has made surprise visits to several countries in the past two weeks on a "peace mission" after Hungary took over the EU's rotating presidency.

In a letter to EU leaders, Orban said US President Joe Biden was “making great efforts” to stay in the race, saying he was “unable to change the current US pro-war policy.”

Orban has also long been critical of European military support for Ukraine in contrast to most allies who support Kyiv’s war effort.

The Hungarian leader said a Trump victory would shift the burden between the United States and the EU on financial support for Ukraine, to the detriment of Europe.

“Our European strategy in the name of transatlantic unity has been to imitate the US pro-war policy. We have not had a sovereign and independent European strategy or political action plan until now,” he said.

“I propose to discuss whether it is rational to continue this policy in the future,” he added.

Orban’s approach clashes with the conclusions of the last EU summit on June 27, when leaders reaffirmed their firm commitment to provide Ukraine with continued political, financial, economic, humanitarian, military, and diplomatic support “as long as necessary and as strong as necessary.”

EU leaders condemned his actions, stressing that PM Orban has no mandate to speak on behalf of the 27 EU member states and that any views he expresses are his own.

Underlining its displeasure with Hungary's diplomacy over the war in Ukraine, which has undermined the EU's long-standing position, the European Commission on Monday took the unprecedented step of banning EU Commissioners from attending meetings held in Hungary under the country's presidency.

Several EU governments are also privately planning to send only civil servants, not government ministers, to the ministerial talks in Hungary. Meanwhile, 63 MEPs in the European Parliament have called on the EU to withdraw Hungary’s voting rights in the bloc.