BUDAPEST, January 16. /TASS/. EU leaders’ bets on Ukraine’s victory over Russia will not pay off, and Kiev will therefore never receive reparations from Moscow to repay the money borrowed from Europeans, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Kossuth Radio.

He recalled that since 2022 Western countries have already provided Ukraine with more than €193 billion. He added that the EU now plans to grant Kiev an interest-free "military loan" of $90 billion in 2026-2027 and allocate another $800 billion over ten years for reconstruction, in addition to military aid. According to Orban, Brussels hopes this money will be repaid through reparations from Moscow and the seizure of frozen Russian assets.

This, he said, is why EU leaders are pushing Ukraine to continue military operations. "Their argument is very simple: the Ukrainian army will win, the Russians will pay reparations, and they will get their money back. But I have never met a single serious expert who would say that the Russians can be defeated on the battlefield to such an extent that they will be forced to pay for it. All these stories are nothing more than fairy tales," the prime minister said.

Orban stressed that the calculations of European politicians advocating the continuation of military action against Russia "do not correspond to reality." He also pointed to the European Union’s lack of funds for military aid to Ukraine. According to him, "the Americans turned out to be smarter and refused to provide it," while Europeans plan to support Kiev through borrowing that will have to be reimbursed by future generations.

The Hungarian prime minister has previously said that EU plans to finance Ukraine are unrealistic. Speaking also on Kossuth Radio, he confirmed that Hungary would not take part in these initiatives by Brussels and Kiev. He also recalled that Slovakia and the Czech Republic had opposed providing Ukraine with a $90 billion "military loan" over the next two years through joint EU borrowing.

Presenting a plan to finance Ukraine in Brussels on January 14, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Commissioner for Economy and Productivity Valdis Dombrovskis argued that Kiev would return the money if Russia compensated for the damage caused or if EU countries managed to expropriate its frozen financial assets.