Orban to meet Trump in Florida after NATO summit, Time reports

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban will meet with former U.S. President Donald Trump on July 12, Time reported, citing unnamed sources familiar with the matter.

Orban may travel to Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida after the NATO summit in Washington, where allies affirmed Ukraine's "irreversible" path toward membership as well as $43 billion in funding for next year.

Prior to that, the Hungarian leader visited Ukraine, Russia, and China on his "peace mission." During his visit to Kyiv, President Volodymyr Zelensky rejected Orban's ceasefire proposal.

Orban has a long-standing relationship with conservatives in the U.S. and is the only European leader who is openly friendly toward the Kremlin. He has spoken highly of Trump on several occasions since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion, praising him as "a man of peace."

The Republican Party's presumptive presidential nominee has repeatedly said he could end Russia's war within 24 hours if elected president, without specifying the steps for reaching a peace deal between Kyiv and Moscow.

Trump did not ask Orban to lay the groundwork for a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia, one of the sources told Time, calling the visit "more informal."

The Hungarian prime minister said in March that Trump would stop funding Ukraine if elected.

The former U.S. president has long criticized U.S. aid to Ukraine, and as the presumptive Republican nominee in the 2024 U.S. elections, his sway over the party had contributed to the months-long deadlock in Congress over U.S. aid to Ukraine.

EU members blasted Orban over rogue diplomacy but pitched no ways to rein him in, media reports

EU ambassadors lambasted Hungary during a meeting in Brussels over the Hungarian prime minister’s so-called “peace mission” in Russia and China, undisclosed European diplomats told the media.

The Kyiv IndependentMartin Fornusek