Orban Escalates Standoff Over Sweden’s Accession to NATO

Marton Kasnyik and Zoltan Simon
·2 min read
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(Bloomberg) -- Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban escalated a standoff with Western allies over Sweden’s NATO accession after a senior US lawmaker called for potential sanctions against the lone holdout.

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Orban’s lawmakers won’t allow a parliamentary vote on ratifying Sweden’s bid until the Nordic country’s leader visits Budapest to meet with his Hungarian counterpart, ATV television reported, citing the ruling Fidesz party. They’ll also boycott a special session the opposition called for Monday on the accession, ATV said on its website.

Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom declined to comment on the report. Fidesz’s parliamentary group didn’t respond to a phone call or email from Bloomberg.

Orban’s invitation for Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson to visit Hungary was extended last month in what was seen as a face-saving step for the nationalist leader after he broke a pledge to ratify Sweden’s accession before Turkey.

Patience over Orban’s obstructionism is wearing thin both inside the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the European Union. On Thursday, Orban finally dropped his opposition to a €50 billion ($54.4 billion) EU aid package for Ukraine after becoming the only of the bloc’s 27 leaders to veto it in December.

Hungary is the “least reliable” NATO member,” US Senator Ben Cardin, the Democratic chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement on Thursday. He urged the Biden administration to consider imposing sanctions on Hungary for corruption and also to weigh the possibility of scrapping its participation in a US visa-waiver program.

Kristersson met Orban on Thursday on the sidelines of an EU summit in Brussels, but said he preferred to come to Budapest only after Hungary’s parliament ratified Sweden’s NATO bid.

He’s been keen to avoid any optics of negotiating with Orban over his country’s accession, after Sweden received an invitation last year to join the military alliance. Sweden’s membership is seen as crucial for bolstering NATO’s ability to defend its eastern flank nearly two years after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Orban has sought to attribute the delay to his own lawmakers, who he said have been hurt by Swedish criticism over the erosion of democracy in Hungary. In fact, Fidesz has a supermajority in the chamber and the party is tightly controlled by the prime minister.

--With assistance from Niclas Rolander.

(Updates with Swedish foreign minister in third paragraph, context throughout.)

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