As bne IntelliNews reported, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban claimed this week that 95% of Hungarians are against Ukraine’s accession to the EU.
The Ukraine’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs shot back that Hungary’s people don’t have the right to have an opinion on Ukraine’s accession. Now the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has answered saying: yes they do.
Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said in a post on social media on June 27: “The MFA of Ukraine said yesterday that the Hungarian people have no right to decide whether they support Ukraine’s accession to the EU. Well, the MFA of Ukraine is wrong.
“Dear Ukrainian colleagues, it’s not you, not [Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy] and not the Ukrainian government who decides on EU membership. That decision belongs to us, the citizens of the EU, Hungarians included,” he added.
Orban has vowed to “do everything” in his power to prevent Ukraine from joining the European Union, and is supported by Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico. Both countries remain highly dependent on Russia for energy imports, from which they are also making a lot of money by reexporting the surpluses to the rest of the EU, in effect ignoring sanctions on Russian exports of oil and gas to the EU.
Other countries such as Poland are lukewarm on Ukraine’s accession. While Warsaw is a staunch supporter of Ukraine’s military effort to face down Russia’s invading forces, it is worried about giving Ukraine’s vast agricultural sector access to EU markets.
As bne IntelliNews reported, Ukraine cannot join the EU unless the Common Agricultural Policy is reformed, as under current rules Kyiv would be entitled to €186bn of subsidies and countries like Poland would go from being net beneficiaries of the EU budget to net contributors.
Cheap Ukrainian grain exports have already wrecked the Polish grain market once in 2023.
The duty-free exemptions on Ukrainian agricultural imports to the EU were allowed to expire on June 5, which will cost Kyiv billions of euros in lost revenue this year.
The EU is due to discuss Ukraine’s accession at a meeting of foreign ministers this week and EU foreign policy chief and former Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas is trying to find a way around Budapest’s de facto veto. She has said that she has a Plan B, which may involve trying to strip Hungary of its voting rights.
“It’s time for you to understand: without the will of the Hungarian people, Ukraine’s accession will simply not happen,” said Szijjártó in his post, as Budapest digs its heels in. “We do not want to be part of an integration process with a country that threatens us with war, puts our energy security at risk and has nearly destroyed our farmers once.”
Polish public support for Ukraine’s EU and NATO membership drops sharply – poll
Public backing in Poland for Ukraine’s accession to the European Union and Nato has fallen significantly since the start of the war, according to a new survey by the research agency IBRiS, commissioned by Polish defence website Defence24 and the Stand With Ukraine foundation.
Only 35% of Poles now believe their country should support Ukraine’s EU membership bid, while 37% back Nato accession. In both cases, 42% of respondents were opposed. These figures stand in stark contrast to polling conducted by IBRiS in 2022, shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion, when 85% supported Ukraine’s EU bid and 75% supported joining Nato, Notes from Poland reports.
“The shift reflects a broader cooling of public sentiment on Polish support for Ukraine,” IBRiS noted.
The survey comes as war weariness and EU sceptics weigh on the Ukrainian cause. Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban said during a speech at the Nato summit on June 25 in the Hague that Ukraine should not be admitted to either the EU or Nato as that could spark a war with Russia.
“Russia is not a threat to Europe; the real danger for it comes from the loss of competitiveness in the global economy and trade,” the Hungarian prime minister said during a brief conversation with journalists before the start of the plenary session at the Nato summit.
The ceasefire discussions that kicked off in Riyadh on February 18 have also come to a dead end and US President Donald Trump is clearly losing interest in the talks. Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy didn’t discuss the ceasefire deal with Russia during their closely watched meeting on the sidelines of the Nato Summit.
“I did not discuss the ceasefire with Zelenskiy. I just wanted to see how he was doing,” Trump told reporters. He also dodged a question about the US continuing to provide military aid to Ukraine. Since he took office, the Trump administration has introduced no new sanctions on Russia whatsoever, nor committed to any new funding or weapons commitments.
As the war drags on into its fourth year, the enthusiasm amongst the general public is also starting to fade. The IBRiS study found that half (52%) of Poles believe the country should continue to support Ukraine in international forums, while 29% disagreed. Economic assistance drew less support, with only 35% in favour and 44% opposed.
The shift also comes amid a changing political landscape. During the 2025 presidential election campaign, three right-wing opposition candidates – Karol Nawrocki, Sławomir Mentzen and Grzegorz Braun – who together secured 51% in the first round, all opposed Ukraine’s membership in Western institutions. Nawrocki later won the second-round run-off. Right leaning parties with anti-war platforms have also done well in recent elections in Germany and Austria, among other countries.
The Polish slide in support marks a divergence from earlier political consensus. In 2022, President Andrzej Duda called for Ukraine to be given an “express path” to EU membership, while then Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki declared Poland “wants to support Ukraine in its efforts to join”. Current Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government reiterated support for Ukraine’s EU ambitions as recently as May and leads European countries in plans to ramp up military spending to the 5% of GDP demanded by the US. Warsaw is in the process of building the largest conventional army in Europe in response to the heightened Russian aggression.
Although Poland has been one of Ukraine’s staunchest allies – hosting millions of refugees and delivering military, economic and humanitarian aid – the new data underscores the growing Ukraine fatigue that has been building slowly for the last two years. Nearly half of respondents (46%) said military aid should be reduced or ended, while only 5% supported increasing it. Another 35% wanted it maintained at current levels.
Despite this, 45% said that Poland’s support for Ukraine enhances the country’s security, compared to 37% who disagreed. Only 15% backed sending Polish troops to Ukraine on a peace mission after the war, with 64% opposed.
On the war’s end, 62% of Poles said Ukraine should begin peace talks with Russia even without a ceasefire. Meanwhile, 35% believe Ukraine should accept the loss of some territory to end the conflict, while 34% disagreed.
Poles are divided on the threat of Russian aggression. When asked to rate the likelihood of a Russian attack on a scale of one to seven, 24% chose the lowest two points, and only 12% selected the highest. Still, 57% believe the United States would honour its Nato obligations and defend Poland if attacked, while 18% thought Washington would not.
Support for increased defence spending remains strong, with 50% in favour and only 5% supporting a reduction. Poland currently spends 4.7% of GDP on defence, the highest proportion in Nato.
A separate Pew Research Center poll published earlier in June found confidence in the US president among Poles has dropped from 75% under Joe Biden to 35% under Donald Trump.
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