Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó denied Hungary’s involvement in the violation of Ukrainian airspace by reconnaissance drones on Friday – accusing President Volodymyr Zelensky of “losing his mind.”
Writing on Telegram at around 2 p.m., Zelensky said that Ukraine’s Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrsky had briefed him about drone violations on Ukraine’s Hungarian border – adding that Hungary is “likely” responsible.
Zelensky said the drones may have been gathering intelligence about industrial sites near the countries’ shared border, and that Kyiv is monitoring the situation.
Szijjártó commented on Kyiv’s allegation a few hours later.
“President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is losing his mind to anti-Hungarian sentiment. Now he is even seeing things that aren’t there,” the Hungarian foreign minister wrote on X.
Szijjártó’s comments drew a furious response from Prime Minister Andrii Sybiha.
“We are starting to see a lot of things, Peter, including your government’s hypocrisy and moral degradation, open and covert work against Ukraine and the rest of the Europe, serving as a Kremlin lackey,” Sybiha said.
“No amount of your attacks on our President will change what we – and everyone – see.”
Relations between the two countries have long been strained – largely due to Hungarian strongman Viktor Orban’s alignment with Moscow. However, they have deteriorated significantly in recent weeks.
Also on Friday, Kyiv announced that three senior Hungarian military officials would be banned from Ukraine – mirroring similar restrictions on key Ukrainian officials visiting Hungary.
Nevertheless, Hungary remains a member of NATO. Hungarian fighter jets were scrambled to intercept five Russian fighter aircraft over the Baltic Sea on Thursday.