Russian government official: Orbán wants Ukraine’s Transcarpathia, parts of Romania, Croatia
According to Mihail Gazin, a Russian economist, PM Viktor Orbán would like to expand the territory of Hungary. Among others, he would like to acquire Ukraine’s Transcarpathia, Transylvania, which is more than a third of Romania’s territory, and a slice of Croatia.
Hungary and its “territorial claims”
Gazin is a Russian analyst, publicist and economist. Before, he was an official of the Russian presidential administration, index.hu wrote. Gazin said in the Cargrad show that, among others, Orbán aimed to expand the territory of Hungary.
He added that provided the war in Ukraine continues, Russia will conquer the country’s Eastern regions. And that is when Orbán will announce his territorial claims against Ukraine. Based on the Serbian Pravda, the territory Budapest would claim is Transcarpathia, which belonged to the Kingdom of Hungary for more than a millennium, until the Treaty of Trianon in 1920. Furthermore, Hungary wants to get Transylvania and a corridor to the sea via Croatia.
Gazin said Orbán was determined since he saw the West can no longer help Ukraine. Moreover, Kyiv has no internal resources to withstand the Russian forces. That is what PM Viktor Orbán talked about in his interview yesterday morning, saying the question was how long the EU can finance the war. The USA can finance Kyiv, but the EU cannot since Brussels need to ask for money from the member states to support Zelenskyy. Orbán suggested in the interview that Budapest would only modify the EU’s budget if they get euro billions of the RRF and development funds frozen by the European Commission due to rule-of-law concerns.
Former Russian president on the same track
That is not the first time a Russian politician or official suggested Hungary would have territorial claims against Ukraine. Last July, Dmitry Medvedev, former president of Russia, shared a map on his Telegram channel showing most of Ukraine’s territory divided between Poland, Hungary, Romania and Russia. You may read more about Medvedev’s crazy idea HERE. And why do we call that crazy? Here is one reason, but there are many more. Poland is one of the biggest supporters of Zelensky, and it would never accept a border with Russia.
But what about Transylvania (Romania) and Croatia? Both are NATO and EU members. Of course, they once belonged to the Kingdom of Hungary, but the number of Hungarians in Croatia does not reach 10,000. Furthermore, Hungary is to create a seaport in Trieste, Italy. Read more about that project HERE.
Finally, PM Orbán and his governments never talked about territorial claims. Instead, Orbán went on an official visit to Bucharest last week, talking about a possible high-speed railway connection between the Romanian capital and Budapest. Read our article HERE.
Thus, Gazin’s suggestions lack any real base, but are perfect for the Kremlin’s propaganda purposes.
I, and some others, have been saying this for months…. he wants to go down in history as the leader who overthrew Trianon and he doesn’t care how many people have to die. Really the worst leader in Europe.
Have the ethnic people of any territories detached from the “mother” country ever totally assimilated? The answer is no. Serbs in Kosovo are unhappy and want nothing to do with ethnic Albanians. Christians in Bosnia have grave problems with Muslims. The powers that be, should stop slicing up countries in the future unless they want another Russa/Ukraine war.
Russia constantly seeks to divide EU countries against each other and will put out propaganda to generate conflict. Orban has to some extent assisted Russia to do this.
Oh come now. Even the most fervent nationalist understands that anything involving disputes over historical territory with Croatia and Romania are not realistic goals or even pressing issues. Outside of the perpetual hostility that the Romanian nationalists hold for Hungary, relations with these neighbors are fairly good.
Transcarpathia on the other hand is definitely within the realm of possibility. If Western funding stops, Ukraine collapses. In that event, and based on how badly the Hungarian minorities have been treated (punitive conscription etc), they may wish to rejoin their parent nation or, at the very least, request deployment of Hungarian peace keepers.
I think its unfair to single the Hungarians out on this issue when its very clear Poland hungers for some of western Ukraine and Romania has its own ambitions in annexing Moldova.
The territory that Victor wants to claim happily left the “kingdom” of the empire in 1920 due to the fact that the people there, slavic and romanian, were treated terribly by their Hungarian rulers, this is a historical fact. If this is the arguement, then for sure the Turks should come and reclaim the territory that they lost in Hungary. And so on and so on.
This must be a joke. How is Hungary going to acquire all this territory? Hungary does not have either the economic or military power to accomplish this.
The existing Hungarian military is inadequate to defend the country.
“very clear Poland hungers for some of western Ukraine”
I live in Poland and follow the news and talk to people…. that is a russian propaganda lie. russia has offered Poland part of Ukraine before and has consistently refused to take part in the partitioning of another country.
Stop spreading russian lies.