Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Europe’s premier anti-globalist head of state, has criticized the Biden administration’s increasingly belligerent involvement in the Russo-Ukraine War, accusing it of perpetuating the bloody conflict by continuing to provide billions in military aid to Ukraine.
On Tuesday, while speaking on a panel discussion in Berlin hosted by the magazine Cicero and the daily newspaper Berliner Zeitung, Orbán suggested that Biden had gone “too far” by calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a war criminal and asserting he “cannot remain in power,” adding that because of his diplomatic ineptitude, it would be “very hard for [Biden] to make peace,” the Hungarian news portal Telex reports.
“The Ukrainians have endless resources because they get all that from the Americans… That is why the Americans have to come to an agreement with the Russians. And then the war will be over,” the Hungarian prime minister said, adding that those who “believe the war will be ended through Russian-Ukrainian negotiations are not living in the real world.”
Orbán, who for years now has been a close ally of the former U.S. president, then said: “Hope for peace is named Donald Trump.”
The prime minister also censured the European Union’s sanctions packages against Russia. He described the sanctions as a “catastrophe,” argued that the “primitive” way in which they have been implemented has harmed—and continues to harm—European interests, and highlighted that Kremlin-owned Gazprom has posted record profits as a result of the runaway oil and gas prices.
“If we had implemented them properly, prices wouldn’t be so sky-high right now,” Orbán said. “In the question of energy, we are dwarfs and the Russians are giants. A dwarf sanctions a giant and we’re all amazed when the dwarf dies.”
The Hungarian leader’s remarks came days after former U.S. President Donald Trump called for an immediate “peaceful end” to the ongoing Russo-Ukraine War, which is now in its eighth month, and warned that we “will end up in World War III and there will be nothing left of our planet” if the escalation continues.
Days earlier, Trump said that the behavior and rhetoric of the Biden administration in the months leading up to the war had contributed to Putin’s fateful decision.
“They actually taunted him, if you really look at it,” Trump began. “Our country, and our so-called leadership, taunted Putin. I said, you know, they’re almost forcing him to go in with what they’re saying. The rhetoric was so dumb.”
