The Tisza Party is proposing that Prime Minister Viktor Orbán – recognizing the validity of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum – should initiate that Budapest host the meeting between Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky. The agreement signed in Budapest 31 years ago addressed security guarantees for Ukraine's territorial integrity and independence, "and now again, a viable long-term agreement about this should be reached," the party’s leader, Péter Magyar wrote in a social media post.
In 1994, after the break-up of the Soviet Union, some 1,700 nuclear warheads remained in Ukraine, and the country would have been able to take over controlling them within a year and a half. Had they done so, they could have become one of the world's most powerful nuclear powers. At the time, however, independence from Russia and Western support seemed more important, so they eventually decided to dismantle these nuclear weapons. The Budapest Memorandum was signed in the Hungarian capital on December 5, 1994 by the major powers, including Russia, in which they guaranteed Ukraine's independence and the inviolability of its borders.
Donald Trump announced in a social media post on Monday evening that he had called Putin to start organizing a meeting between the Russian and the Ukrainian presidents, which would then be followed by a trilateral summit between the three of them. Such an order of events was proposed by Putin. According to a senior US government official, the meeting may well take place in Hungary, the Guardian reports.
Responding to a journalist's question, Emmanuel Macron rejected the option of a meeting in Paris, where the two had met in 2019. The French leader said that a neutral country would have to be found. "Perhaps Switzerland, I am in favor of Geneva," he said.
According to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, the meeting could take place within the next two weeks. The last direct talks between Russia and Ukraine were held in June in Turkey, where Putin sent a low-level delegation despite Zelensky's invitation that he come as well.
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