“At Christmas at least, no one should die on the front line,” Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in an interview to public radio on Friday, outlining his recent proposal to the warring Russian and Ukrainian sides regarding a ceasefire.

Orbán said that at Hungary’s initiative an offer was on the table, and the sides may also “agree on an exchange of prisoners of war at last, which would make hundreds of thousands of people happy”.

“One side has accepted the proposal while the other apparently rejects it, but still there are a few days until Christmas, so let’s hope that the situation can change,” the prime minister added.

“While we swim in international waters, the Hungarian pool is paramount; we must keep that tidy, first and foremost,” Orbán said. The 2025 budget is taking its final shape, giving an outlook for families and businesses for the next year, he added.

Orbán said Hungarian diplomacy had gone above and beyond to attempt to gain a “few days of a ceasefire” as was befitting “a thousand-year-old Christian European state”.

Orbán spoke with the Americans, the Russians, the Europeans, the Turks

The prime minister noted that he had spoken with “the Americans, the Russians, the Europeans, the Turks”, and he was positive that once Donald Trump took office the world would make an about-turn.

“We’re still in perilous times: the governments in Germany and France have failed and Syria, the biggest source of migration in the past decade, has seen it’s government toppled,” he said.

He added, however, that no longer would “we have to navigate stormy seas” and “calmer waters lie before us”.

Orbán said it would only take “a day or two after January 20” for the about-turn to take place, because “the new administration in America will get off to a flying start”, and the changes would soon reach Europe on issues “that are also most important to us”.

Romania, Bulgaria Schengen Zone membership “fantastic achievement”

The prime minister called Romania and Bulgaria’s accession to the Schengen zone a “fantastic” achievement, adding that Romania’s accession had been long awaited by ethnic Hungarians and was “a crucial step for the unity of the Hungarian nation”. In the interview, Orbán said this achievement was owing to the efforts of interior minister Sándor Pintér and European affairs minister János Bóka.

Orbán said big European countries had blocked their accession, and removing the obstacle had been “no small diplomatic feat”.

He added that Hungarians in Transylvania had looked forward to Schengen accession for a long time, and now they could travel without barriers in the way.

Romanians, too, had wanted it, so a “sunny afternoon” had emerged in the history of stormy Romanian-Hungarian relations. He added that Romania “knows this and has been constructive”.

After a transitional period, “we can remove our police” from the Romanian-Hungarian border, he said, adding that the would relieve law enforcement of staffing problems.

Attempt to involve Hungary in the Syrian conflict

Meanwhile, Orbán said an attempt had been made to “involve Hungary in a hot conflict” by concocting and spreading a story that would put Hungary in the cross hairs. He told public radio that the “fake news” regarding Syrian President Assad’s appearance in Budapest had been “the most important event of the week” and the most “painful”.

Orbán noted that during the first phase of the Syrian civil war around 2015, a massive migration and terror wave “swept through Europe” and hundreds of people had died in Europe.

“So what’s going on in Syria and its impact on Europe is not … a joke or fake news that can be spread; this could get bloody,” he said.

The prime minister said “someone wants to involve Hungary in a hot conflict … and make Hungary a target.” He added that someone was hunting Assad and whoever claimed that Assad was in Hungary had wanted to make the country a “hunting ground”.

“Who’s behind this? Who came up with this? For what purpose? Who from Hungary were involved? Through whom was this hoax spread? What did they want to achieve?” he asked.

We covered the issue in THIS article.

UPDATE: Orbán says all troubles are rooted in the war

Concerning Hungary’s 2025 budget, Orbán said “the key word is war … all troubles of the European economy are rooted in the war [in Ukraine],” adding that “if we want to cure the European economy, Hungary’s included, we must start by putting an end to the war.”

He said parliament had set the date for adopting the budget to December because “the US election has provided an answer to the question whether 2025 should call for a war or a peace budget.”

A turnaround will happen and “the 2025 budget should be based on that turnaround,” he said. “So far, we have had war years, and now … years of peace will come; the goal is to make the Hungarian economy strong again,” Orbán said.

For Hungarian families, he said, this meant that “in 2025, we can start on an upward path”. “We’ll have a fantastic year ahead.”

Once “the ominous cloud of war” disappears, he added, life would change and “efforts will become more meaningful; the budget is built on that fact of psychology,” the prime minister said.

He said the government expected an economic growth of above 3 percent “in the first peace year after the war” and planned “a number of measures to lift the country”.

Firm financial foundations for economic growth

He noted the recent three-year agreement with trade unions and employers aiming at ensuring a 40 percent pay rise, “the largest in Europe in recent decades”. He also noted a significant hike for teachers in 2024, which he said would continue next year, as well as higher wages for water management staff and for the judiciary.

The prime minister added, however, that wages were “still unfair” in certain sectors, but he pledged to provide a remedy in the next three years. “Now we can see the light at the end of the tunnel; once the war is over, everybody will see that their efforts have a point … and their work is profitable,” he said.

Referring to a credit rating agency’s recent decision to revise Hungary’s rating from negative to stable, Orbán said this meant that “rating agencies are saying that Hungary’s economic plans for 2025 have firm financial foundations.” He said some agencies had more positive views and others were “more restrained”, but “the carpet is hovering … it will fly”.

Hungary will complete 500 new investment projects next year and start 300 new ones, with BMW and China’s BYD car plants, as well as several large battery makers starting production, Orbán said, adding that “all this reflects that the government’s hopes for economic growth really have firm financial and economic foundations.”

Meanwhile, in connection with the murder of a boy 24 years ago, details of which have recently come to light, Orbán said a lesson from case was that “a missing child must be searched for and you should never give up.” He said, however, that the police had done a “fantastic” job; they “never gave up, they did not shut the case down, and they take their job of fighting crime seriously.”

Read also:

• Orbán and Putin phone call: Bilateral cooperation, Ukraine, and Middle East tensions – read more HERE
• Hungarian PM Orbán: ‘I trust after Donald Trump takes office, we will experience its beneficial effect’ – details in THIS article