Ukraine can’t win the war against Russia, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said.
With NATO not ready to send troops, “there is no chance for poor Ukrainians to win this war,” Orban said in an interview with Bloomberg Editor in Chief John Micklethwait on Tuesday.
Orban’s government is not part of the “mainstream” European Union approach on Ukraine after Russia invaded its neighbor last year, he said at the Qatar Economic Forum in Doha.
Hungary is blocking a further €500 million-euro ($540 million) tranche of European Union financial aid to Ukraine. It is also against new sanctions against Russia, citing bilateral disputes with the government in Kyiv.
They include a demand to take OTP Bank Nyrt. — Hungary’s largest lender which has operations in both Russia and Ukraine — off of a Ukrainian list of international war sponsors.
Orban, who is President Vladimir Putin’s closest partner in the EU, has dragged his feet on supporting the bloc’s penalties against Russia and refused to join other members in supplying weapons to Ukraine.
He has urged the EU to consider cutting financing to Kyiv, which critics said is akin to pushing for capitulation to Russian aggression.
The government of the State of Qatar is the underwriter of the Qatar Economic Forum, Powered by Bloomberg.
