Hungarian FM Anita Orbán files complaint over Péter Szijjártó’s use of a private jets

As a result of the ongoing internal review at the ministry, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has filed another criminal complaint, Anita Orbán announced on her Facebook page.

In the video, the Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs shared that their findings show that in 2022, under her predecessor, Péter Szijjártó's leadership, the ministry essentially shifted to routinely using chartered private jets or the Hungarian Armed Forces’ special aircraft whenever the minister and his delegation traveled abroad. While the number of trips and the nature of diplomatic events and programs remained largely unchanged, trips that had previously been made on scheduled flights were increasingly completed by privately chartered aircraft. “This happened despite the fact that the ministry’s applicable internal regulations do not even include this travel option and explicitly prescribe frugality as a guiding principle for such trips,” Orbán said.

“Based on the travel data reviewed and the documents related to the aircraft charters found so far, according to our very conservative estimate, these trips cost 5.6 times more—or 4 billion forints (nearly €11 million) more—on average between 2022 and 2026 than if the delegations had used business-class on scheduled flights.”

This figure does not include the cost of military aircraft.

“There were times when an aircraft was chartered for destinations just a few hundred kilometers away—to Bratislava, Vienna, or Belgrade—places that can be easily reached by car or train in a few hours. In some cases, the charter was approved the day before the trip. It also happened that a private plane was chartered using public funds, specifically so that the minister could return from the United States in time for his own campaign event. According to Orbán, the audit found no evidence that cheaper travel options were even considered prior to making any of these arrangements.

“In my view, these revelations are grounds for suspecting unlawful misappropriation resulting in particularly significant financial loss, and they raise questions about the responsibility of the ministry’s former senior leadership,” said Anita Orbán.

In recent months, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has already shared several details about the trips of Péter Szijjártó and the ministry’s delegations. In 2025 alone, former FM Szijjártó spent more than two billion forints (more than €5 million) on air travel, and according to the summary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a private jet was chartered 19 times for his official trips last year alone. György Velkey, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, previously said that between 2022 and 2026, Péter Szijjártó flew on private jets more than fifty times, which cost nearly five billion forints. A public interest data request by Hvg.hualso revealed that, on average, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the delegations travelling with him spent 780,000 forints (€2100) per trip on using VIP lounges abroad. The most expensive instance occurred in Russia in 2021, where the bill for the VIP lounge totaled more than 11 million forints (nearly €30 thousand) for a delegation which consisted of 15 people.

In the months leading up to the government change, 255 million forints (almost €700,000) were spent on chartering private aircraft, but there were several instances in which the reserved aircraft ended up not being used, thus effectively wasting the allocated funds.