Today, Friday (11/28/2025), Russian President Vladimir Putin received in the Kremlin, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, to talk about Russian oil and gas supplies and negotiations on the peace plan in Ukraine.
The foreign ministers of the two countries, Russian Sergei Lavrov and Hungarian Peter Szijjarto, and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak, the energy policy coordinator in this country, which supplies Budapest with oil and gas at below-market prices, are participating in the meeting.
The ultra-nationalist Orban had announced that the goals of his visit were to ensure Russian gas and oil supplies to Hungary and to address the situation in the peace negotiations in Ukraine. Orban also announced that in his meeting with Putin, they would discuss the issue of war in Ukraine.
Orban’s proposal to host peace negotiations for Ukraine in Budapest
Russian President Vladimir Putin accepted the proposal presented to him in the Kremlin by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to host peace negotiations on Ukraine in Budapest.
“If the Budapest platform is used during our negotiations, I will also be happy. And I want to thank you for your willingness to help,” Putin said at the beginning of the meeting in the Kremlin Palace.
Putin stressed that it actually seemed good to him when, last October, US President Donald Trump offered the Hungarian capital a place to hold the Russian-American summit, which was very bad for the European Union, although the meeting was later cancelled.
He commented: “It was an offer from Donald. He said: ‘We have a good relationship with Hungary. You and Viktor had a good relationship, and so did I. Of course we accepted it gladly.’
Orban stressed that today’s meeting in the Kremlin – the fourteenth according to his calculations – allows him “to confirm, Mr. President, the readiness of Hungary to offer itself as a place for such negotiations, and is ready to contribute to the successful outcome of this process.”
Hungary is “interested in maintaining energy dialogue” with Russia
“Hungary is interested in maintaining the energy dialogue with your country,” Orban assured the Kremlin president, adding: “I believe that in the current political climate, we have made a great effort to develop cooperation between our peoples. I sincerely hope that we will do more.”
“The basis of Hungary’s energy security lies in the stable supply of Russian energy resources, past, present and future,” the Hungarian Prime Minister said.
He insisted that Budapest highly values the stability and predictability of Russian energy supplies.
German Chancellor Merz: Orban travels to see Putin without a European mandate
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Friday that the trip made by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on the same day to Moscow took place without a European mandate and without consulting his EU partners, expressing doubts that this new visit to Russia will lead to any results.
He said: “He travels without a European mandate, and he travels without consulting us, but this is not new. He has his own ideas for ending this war, which have not been realized so far. If someone has a better idea than us, it would be very welcome. But I doubt that this time it will be more successful than the previous one, unfortunately,” referring to Orban’s previous visit to Russia, in July last year, once he assumed the rotating presidency of the European Council.
In a joint press conference with Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golub, he pointed out that the previous visit was not only fruitless, but that a few days after it, attacks were launched by the most violent members of the Russian army against infrastructure and civilian targets in Ukraine.
“I hope that Russia will not behave in the same way this time,” he said.
Merz added that Orban’s position has been known to European partners for years, and regarding this visit, he said that he wished the matter had been different, “but every head of government in the European Union bears his own responsibility.”
For his part, Golub announced, “I apologize, but I will not be very diplomatic in my response. I am afraid that Viktor Orban has stopped playing for the European national team a long time ago, and this visit is also part of this context.”
Brussels calls on Putin to sit at the negotiating table to end the war in Ukraine
“The European Union’s message to Moscow is very clear. (The European Union) asks Moscow and the person who leads the country, President Putin, to come to the negotiating table. This is the message to Moscow,” European Commission spokeswoman Paula Pinho announced at the Community Foundation’s daily press conference.
Pinho spoke to this effect after being questioned about Hungarian Prime Minister Orban’s trip to Moscow. Specifically, he was asked whether Budapest had contacted the European Commission before traveling to Moscow and whether Viktor Orbán had conveyed a message from the EU to the Russian capital.
CP (efe, rtr, dpa, ape)