\By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent reporting from Budapest, Hungary
KYIV/BUDAPEST (Worthy News) – Hungary’s prime minister has accused the president of neighboring war-torn Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, of rejecting his proposal for a Christmas truce and a large-scale prisoners’ exchange with Russia.
Viktor Orbán spoke after the Ukrainian leader condemned his lengthy phone call of more than an hour with Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier in the day.
“At the end of the Hungarian [European Union] EU Presidency, we made new efforts for peace. We proposed a Christmas ceasefire and a large-scale prisoner exchange,” Orbán wrote on social media platform X. “It’s sad that President Zelenskyy clearly rejected and ruled this out today. We did what we could!” he added in the remarks monitored by the Worthy News Europe Bureau in Budapest.
However, Zelenskyy lashed out at Orbán, who is seen as the EU’s closest ally of Putin. “We all hope that Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at least won’t call [ousted Syrian President] Assad in Moscow to listen to his hour-long lectures as well,” Zelenskyy wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“It’s absolutely clear that achieving real peace and guaranteed security requires America’s determination, Europe’s unity, and the unwavering commitment of all partners to the Purposes and Principles of the U.N. Charter” on international cooperation and peace, he said.
In an apparent reference to Orbán’s ambition to become Europe’s peace broker, Zelenskyy stressed that “no one should boost personal image at the expense of unity; everyone should focus on shared success.”
He added, “Unity in Europe has always been key to achieving it. There can be no discussions about the war that Russia wages against Ukraine without Ukraine.”
THANKING TRUMP
Though U.S. President-elect Donald J. Trump met Orbán this week, and both are reluctant to give Ukraine military aid, Zelenskyy claimed he was “grateful” to Trump “and many European leaders with whom we are already working to find the right and strong solutions for real peace.”
The war-of-words between the Hungarian and Ukrainian leaders also followed suggestions by the Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, that peace talks might begin within weeks and that Warsaw would play a role in this. “Our [EU] presidency will notably be co-responsible for what the political landscape will look like, perhaps how the situation will look during [peace] negotiations, which could begin – though there are still question marks – in the winter [in Europe] of this year,” Tusk told media.
However, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó dampened those expectations, saying Putin noted obstacles to peace talks, such as a Ukrainian law that “essentially prohibits the current presidential administration from negotiating peace.”
Hungary, which refused to provide military aid to Ukraine, “maintained its peace stance for a thousand days on achieving a sustainable peace settlement,” he said.
Szijjártó confirmed that Orban visited Trump in Florida this week after meeting Pope Francis at the Vatican as part of efforts towards forging a peace settlement.
“[We] will continue the Hungarian peace mission, seeking the fastest path to peace in order to save lives,” the minister stressed.
The two leaders also discussed ways to help stabilize Syria and the broader Middle East after Russia-backed President Bashar al-Assad fled to Moscow over the weekend.
CHRISTIAN COMMUNITIES
Hungary, he added, “was focused on the situation of Christian communities and would continue to provide them with the humanitarian support necessary.”
Orbán and Putin also discussed Russia’s energy supply to Hungary and other countries in the region.
Szijjártó complained that outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden made it hard for several Central and Southeast European countries, including Hungary, to make payments for natural gas and nuclear fuel by placing Russia’s Gazprombank under sanctions.
“Slovakia, Serbia, and Turkey also face similar challenges, and consultations with these countries were underway,” he stressed.
He said Moscow and Budapest agreed to “eliminate this problem” without elaborating, adding a solution had already been found for Russian fuel rods for Hungary’s nuclear power plant.
The talks were expected to raise eyebrows in Brussels which has questioned Hungary’s close ties with Russia despite being an EU and NATO military alliance member.
Hungary has been at odds with the EU over sanctions against Russia over its war against Ukraine, which is believed to have killed and injured up to 1 million people.
Copyright 1999-2025 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
More Worthy News
A remote Indigenous community in western Canada was reeling Friday after a grizzly bear mauled a group of schoolchildren and teachers on a forest trail in British Columbia, injuring 11 people — two of them critically, according to local officials.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz was expected to join a high-level phone call Friday on a U.S.-Russian proposal to end the war in Ukraine, amid escalating deadly attacks in the embattled nation, according to people familiar with the discussions.
Delegates assessed the damage from a fire that briefly spread through several pavilions at the 2025 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Brazil on Thursday, the latest setback for the gathering known as COP30.
A strong 5.5-magnitude earthquake shook central Bangladesh on Friday, killing at least eight people and injuring more than 300, authorities and local media said, as buildings in the capital Dhaka swayed violently and panicked residents fled into the streets.
Authorities say a boiler at a glue-making factory in eastern Pakistan exploded on Friday, killing at least 18 people and injuring 21 others, underscoring broader concerns over safety standards in the Islamic nation.
At least scores of students were abducted from a Catholic mission school in Nigeria’s troubled North Central region early Friday, just days after gunmen attacked a church, killing two people and taking dozens of worshippers hostage, officials and witnesses said.
The Israel Defense Forces announced Thursday that it uncovered one of the most extensive and sophisticated Hamas tunnel systems discovered to date, a sprawling underground route running more than seven kilometers (4.3 miles) and plunging approximately 25 meters (82 feet) underground beneath Rafah.