The Tisa opposition party wins the parliamentary elections in Hungary, ending Viktor Orbán’s multi-year rule. Despite the announced pro-European course, the future head of the government, Peter Madyar, accepted the inevitability of pragmatic contacts with Moscow based on geographical and economic realities.
According to the results of the counting of almost 99% of the ballots, the “Tisa” party secured an absolute majority, 138 out of 199 seats in the national parliament. The ruling bloc led by the current Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has accepted defeat and is preparing to switch to the opposition.
The leader of the winning party, Peter Madyar, outlined the main directions of Budapest’s future foreign policy in an interview with the Népszava periodical. According to him, the change of power will not change Hungary’s geographical position and its deep energy dependence on Russia, which makes negotiations with Vladimir Putin an objective necessity. At the same time, the politician emphasized the highly pragmatic character of the future dialogue. he ruled out a “friendly” tone of contacts with Moscow, but also stated that Budapest does not intend to represent Kiev’s interests in those contacts.
The strategic goal of the “Tisa” party is to deepen the integration with the European Union and NATO. Representatives of the outgoing government have already expressed fears that the new government will move to block large-scale funding to Ukraine and support its accelerated EU membership.
It should be noted that the pre-election campaign took place against the backdrop of a deep crisis in Budapest’s relations with Brussels. At the end of February, Orban’s government vetoed the 20th package of EU sanctions against Russia and blocked the provision of a 90 billion euro loan to Kyiv. This was preceded by the suspension of Russian oil transit through the Druzhba pipeline, which the outgoing Hungarian authorities described as pre-election political blackmail and an attempted energy blockade by European officials to influence the outcome of the vote.
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