Hungary will block negotiations on Ukraine's accession to the EU without amendments on minority rights

MOSCOW, June 30 – RIA Novosti. Budapest will block negotiations on Ukraine's accession to the EU if there are no amendments to the law on the rights of the Hungarian minority, Hungarian Foreign Minister Anita Orban said in parliament.

“A bilateral agreement on the rights of the Hungarian minority is a condition for negotiations on Ukraine’s accession to the EU within a certain cluster. That is, if the legislative amendments that Ukrainians are obliged to make are not adopted in 2026 and 2027, then European negotiations on each cluster will automatically stop,” she said.

This is how Orban answered the question about the specific terms and conditions for which Hungary agreed to a deal with Kiev.

“Ukraine has committed to reflect the content of this agreement in legal form through amendments to the law. These changes will occur continuously throughout 2026 and 2027,” she concluded.

In early June, Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar stated that Budapest, after an agreement with Kiev on the return of the rights of Transcarpathian Hungarians, would not interfere with the start of negotiations on Ukraine’s accession to the EU. At the same time, Hungary remains against the accelerated accession of any country, including Ukraine, to the EU and adheres to an approach “based on merit,” he emphasized.

The EU granted Ukraine and Moldova candidate country status in June 2022. However, they recognized that this was mostly a symbolic decision with the aim of supporting Kyiv and Chisinau in the confrontation with Moscow. In June 2024, the first intergovernmental conferences between them and the European Union were held in Luxembourg, thus launching the process of accession negotiations.