BUDAPEST, August 27. /TASS/. European politicians are currently the most serious obstacle on the path to peace in Ukraine because they aspire to prolong the armed conflict in order to avoid liability for their previous wrong decisions, Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjarto said at a meeting with the readers of the Mandiner magazine in Budapest.
"I think that nowadays, European politicians are the most serious obstacle on the path to peace in Ukraine. They are not interested in peace and practically daily add fuel to the fire," he said in a speech broadcast on social networks.
Szijjarto believes that "Europe’s political elite wants to avoid responsibility for its erroneous policy over the last three and a half years" and therefore supports continuing the Ukraine conflict. "While the war continues, they can avoid any political responsibility. As soon as the war is over, they will have to take it on," he explained.
According to him, Vladimir Zelensky must also be held accountable for his actions. "As soon as the war is over, the Ukrainian president will have to reply to a question as to why he did not sign the Istanbul agreement [with Russia] in April 2022, which, from Ukraine’s point of view, is undoubtedly no worse than the one he can hope for three and a half years later," Szijjarto said.
Since the onset of the special military operation, Russia and Ukraine have been holding talks, first in Belarus and at the end of March 2022 — in Istanbul. By this time, the delegations had initialed a draft agreement which included, in particular, Ukraine’s obligations on a neutral non-aligned status and the rejection of stationing foreign arms, including nuclear ones, on its territory.
However, Ukraine unilaterally broke off the negotiation process. As head of the Ukrainian delegation David Arakhamia admitted later, this happened at the insistence of then UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson who made a special trip to Kiev.