Sweden has been trying to join NATO for around 20 months. But Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán sets conditions for this.
The tussle over Sweden’s NATO accession is now a chapter richer: After Turkey gave the green light after a long blockade, Hungary is now the only state to continue to delay accession – despite Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s announcement in January that his country would agree become.
At the end of January, Orbán announced that he would give up resistance to Sweden’s accession to NATO. He told NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg this on the phone. However, he left the reasons open. Last Friday, however, Orbán’s Fidesz party announced that he would not ratify the accession until Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson visits him in Budapest.
“He’s playing with our security… again”
The Hungarian opposition scheduled a special session in parliament this Monday in order to vote on Sweden’s accession. Various ambassadors from NATO countries attended the meeting in the visitors’ gallery as a sign of support. But international pressure didn’t help either: MPs from the ruling Fidesz party boycotted the meeting and thus also the vote.
Former Belgian Prime Minister and current MEP Guy Verhofstadt sharply criticized Hungary: “Orbán’s MPs are not showing up to vote on his own NATO promise… He is playing with our security… again,” the liberal politician wrote on X and demanded: “Not just Europe… the entire liberal-democratic West must isolate him once and for all!”
Next regular meeting at the end of February
Fidesz, on the other hand, repeated Orbán’s demand that Kristersson first pay a visit to the country. The party could then vote on membership – but only at the next regular meeting after the winter break at the end of February. “If it is important to Swedes, then it is clear that the Swedish prime minister is coming to Budapest,” Fidesz said in an email to Reuters.
Kristersson and Orbán met on the sidelines of the EU summit last Thursday. Kristersson then told Swedish reporters that he had “a good conversation with Orbán.” He left it open when there would be a more in-depth meeting in Hungary. However, the Swede made it clear that he preferred not to travel to Budapest until Hungary had ratified and Sweden had all the ratifications for its NATO membership.
In response to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, Sweden applied for NATO membership together with Finland in May 2022, around 20 months ago. Finland was welcomed into the alliance as the 31st member at the beginning of April last year.
