BUDAPEST, July 19. /TASS/. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban intends to carry on with his peace mission on Ukraine, but does not want to make his next steps public fearing that they could be disrupted, the premier said on Friday on air of Kossuth radio station.
Orban said he does not think he is being overly cautious as there are forces out there that are not interested in a peaceful settlement of the Ukrainian conflict.
"This caution is quite reasonable because the peace mission was met with a lot of opposition," he noted. "If I announce my next step numerous parties will try to get me not to take it. One should always act first and talk later and this is what I am going to do."
The Hungarian premier also pointed out that the recent assassination attempts against Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico and ex-US President Donald Trump were in fact targeting all politicians belonging to the "peace party."
An armed attack on Fico took place in the western Slovak town of Handlova on May 15. The politician suffered gunshot wounds and had to undergo several surgeries. The attacker was arrested. An assassination attempt on Trump took place at a pre-election rally in Pennsylvania on July 13. The former president was wounded but his life is not in danger: the bullet tore off a small piece of his ear. One of his supporters was killed in the shooting. The attacker was killed by the Secret Service.
During his peace mission, Orban visited Kiev on July 2, where he had talks with Zelensky; three days later, he met with Putin in Moscow. According to the prime minister’s political advisor and namesake Balazs Orban, after these visits, Hungary got the impression that "Ukraine and Russia are determined to keep fighting," and that mediators’ efforts are necessary to organize negotiations between the two sides.
After Moscow, the Hungarian prime minister visited Beijing on July 8 to discuss the situation around Ukraine with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Then, he traveled to Washington D.C., where he held talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the sidelines of the NATO summit.
After the summit, he visited Trump in Florida, where he also discussed ways to settle the Ukrainian conflict. After that, Orban said that Trump will "solve this problem" if he wins the presidential election and returns to the White House.