The European Commission (EC) has published a joint declaration calling for increasing the flow of military aid to Ukraine without unanimous support of EU leaders, following a summit in Brussels on Thursday. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban once again refused to sign the meeting’s culminating document.
EC rules state that such documents require the unanimous support of all 27 members of the EU. Thursday’s joint statement was published as a short, three-sentence document, with the lengthy declaration urging more military aid to Kiev added as an appendix, bypassing Orban’s veto. The subject will be raised again on Friday, it said.
Orban explained that he was opposed to the bloc’s “pro-war” position on the Ukraine conflict.
“We will not allow a common European position to be formed that includes Hungary and is pro-war,” the Hungarian leader said in a statement after the meeting.
Earlier this month, Orban vetoed €30 billion (£32 billion) in proposed EU military aid for Kiev, arguing that it served the continuation of the Ukraine conflict.
Commenting on the decision in an interview to the media, the Hungarian leader insisted that the bloc cannot afford to bankroll Ukraine in its entirety. On top of funding its military, the EU would have to support all Ukrainian civic government, as “Ukraine, as a state, is not functioning,” he said.
Moscow has repeatedly argued that the supply of Western armaments to Ukraine only serves to prolong the conflict, while effectively making making its backers in the West party to the conflict.
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