Orbán's Ukrainian gamble: seized cash, the Kremlin connection and Europe’s silence

"We cannot allow EU space to be turned into a feudal medieval Europe." That was how Andrii Pyshnyy, the head of the National Bank of Ukraine, closed the letters he sent to top European officials regarding the arbitrary actions of the Hungarian authorities (European Pravda has seen copies of these documents). 

Kyiv is launching a legal and political fight against Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s regime in several jurisdictions at once.

On 5 March, two Ukrainian vehicles belonging to the state-run Oschadbank were seized by a Hungarian special service as they were transporting gold and US$80 million in cash. The employees who were escorting the consignment were kept handcuffed for more than a day. They were denied access to either a lawyer or a consul, and eventually they were deported, after being robbed as well, since their phones and personal cash were never returned.

Moreover, the Hungarian authorities have no intention of returning the seized money and gold.

To create at least some legal basis for this, the Hungarian parliament has urgently passed an "individual" law prohibiting the return of the assets to Ukraine.

Meanwhile, the Hungarian government has issued a demand: the seized money will only be returned to Ukraine if Ukraine restores the transit of Russian oil to Hungary. Kyiv has described this as "banditry" and "state terrorism", but the Hungarian government is deaf to such accusations.

There are reasons behind these drastic measures by Orbán’s team.

First, there’s more than just oil at stake. Orbán is using the "Ukrainian gold" story in his political struggle against his electoral rival, Péter Magyar. He claims that the Hungarian opposition is being bankrolled by a "Ukrainian military mafia".

Second, there is information to suggest Kremlin involvement in Hungary’s actions.

Against this backdrop, Kyiv has been trying to obtain public support from Europe, but to no avail: the EU remains deliberately silent.

Torture, threats and other "minor violations"

The reality of what happened in Hungary on 5 March is hard to take in. Kyiv, too, initially remained silent when the news began to trickle in.

Oschadbank first realised something was wrong when its automatic geolocation system showed that two armoured cash-in-transit vehicles carrying cash to Ukraine via Hungary had suddenly changed their route, headed towards Budapest, and stopped on the territory of the country’s Counterterrorism Centre. Phone calls to the employees went unanswered.

At the same time, the Hungarian authorities were ignoring the urgent enquiries being made by Ukrainian diplomats. This left little doubt that it was a special operation. On the night of 5-6 March, Kyiv issued a statement on the seizure of the money and Ukrainian hostages by the Hungarian state.

The diplomatic pressure was kept up for a day. Then, without officially informing Ukraine, the Hungarians brought the detained Ukrainians as far as the border, informed them that they were banned from entering the EU for three years, and expelled them from the country.

Later, details of their detention became known that shocked Ukraine.

The two armoured vehicles, which had been regularly transporting cash to Ukraine in recent years under an official contract from Raiffeisen Bank International in Austria, had been travelling along their usual route, of which the Hungarian side had been informed.

During a scheduled stop at a petrol station on the Budapest ring road, the Ukrainians – who, in line with international rules, were unarmed – were attacked by armed representatives of a Hungarian special service. According to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, the special forces even had grenade launchers and machine guns.

Even more shocking were the details of the bank employees’ detention. They were kept in handcuffs for more than a day, and for much of that time they were blindfolded (according to some reports, ski masks were put on them back-to-front and pressed tightly down on their eyes). One of the detainees lost consciousness. Such detention conditions are considered equivalent to torture.

While breaking into the armoured vehicles, the Hungarian "counter-terrorist" officers also told at least two of the Ukrainians that they would never see Ukraine again and would remain in prison in Hungary.

Finally, the Ukrainians were also robbed. Their phones, money and other personal belongings were not returned to them when they were deported.

The Russian hallmark in Orbán’s special operation

However, no official charges were brought against the Ukrainians. They were interrogated as "witnesses" to an unclear crime. The questioning, contrary to the rules, was conducted not in Ukrainian but in Russian, and the Ukrainians were required to answer in Russian.

European Pravda sources say that one of the "Hungarians" who conducted the interrogation spoke Russian like a native speaker. This is not conclusive proof that he was Russian, but the possibility cannot be ruled out.

There are in fact several reasons to believe that Russians were involved in the special operation.

Orbán’s party election headquarters is known to be working with political strategists from Moscow, who arrived in Hungary under diplomatic cover. They are members of a Kremlin team that specialises in interfering in foreign elections, led by Sergey Kiriyenko, deputy head of Vladimir Putin’s presidential administration.

Until recently, this team had been working in Moldova, where, among other things, they built a network of bots to influence online discussions.

Tellingly, Hungarian-language posts promoting narratives favourable to Orbán about the seizure of the cash-in-transit vehicles suddenly received thousands of likes from users listing their place of residence as Moldova. The "bot farm" had simply been moved from Moldova to Hungary, saving the effort of creating new identities for the accounts. This anomaly was spotted by Hungarian fact-checkers, and the Russians will likely rectify this error.

But European Pravda sources believe Russia’s involvement is not limited to the internet.

It’s widely thought that it was the Russians who pointed the Hungarians to that particular convoy, which included Hennadii Kuznetsov, a former top official of the Security Service of Ukraine now working in Oschadbank’s security service. His name was reported in Russian sources while the detained Ukrainians were still behind bars and their names had not yet been made public.

Nevertheless, it is the Hungarian government that bears responsibility for this operation.

There is no doubt that it was personally approved by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Interestingly, only half a day before the attack on the Ukrainian convoy, Orbán personally visited the counterterrorism centre that would later seize the armoured vehicles.

This visit provided political approval to the officers, who understood that attacking armoured cash-in-transit vehicles with flashing lights and breaking into bank safes was clearly illegal.

Why did Orbán need to do this?

What is the objective of such a blatant and obvious violation of all the rules? What does Orbán stand to gain? Is all of this really just to blackmail Ukraine into reopening the oil pipeline?

The true purpose of the special operation is political. On 12 April, elections are set to be held that could result in a change of government in Hungary.

Media outlets loyal to the government have claimed that the seized money may have been intended to bankroll opposition leader Péter Magyar and his Tisza party.

There is no evidence to support these accusations, and there are documents that actually contradict them. Nevertheless, the Hungarian parliament urgently passed a law stipulating that the state has the right to confiscate the money and valuables from the two specific Ukrainian vehicles and must hold them for at least 60 days while checking whether the funds were intended to finance the Hungarian opposition.

This has to be the first time in history that a law was passed purely for two specific vehicles.

Why is this so important for Orbán? The explanation is simple: financing a political party from abroad is considered an extremely serious violation of electoral law – one that could even potentially lead to a party being removed from the election race.

Despite being unsubstantiated, this accusation quickly became a central element of Orbán’s propaganda campaign. Efforts to promote this narrative are reportedly being assisted by a Kremlin team, whose activities have been confirmed by the Financial Times.

It is unlikely that these accusations will ever reach a court. The chances of proving this claim are virtually zero, even within Hungary’s judicial system. But in information warfare, just making the accusation is often enough.

Europe’s silence and Ukraine’s response

When European Pravda asked Volodymyr Zelenskyy about his expectations of Ukraine’s Western partners in this situation, he responded: "I have spoken with many of them about this, and I will repeat publicly what I said to them: today Europe needs to do one thing – not remain silent."

Yet silent the EU has remained.

The European Commission and other EU bodies have no direct leverage over the intelligence services of member states. Under European law, this area falls under exclusive national competence.

However, in his attack on Ukraine, Orbán has gone so far that the EU now has grounds to intervene. Kyiv has even suggested how this could be done.

On Monday, Andrii Pyshnyy, head of the National Bank of Ukraine, sent official letters to several European leaders: his Austrian counterpart Martin Kocher; Christine Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank; Kaja Kallas, the EU’s top diplomat; and John Berrigan, the European Commission’s Director‑General for Financial Stability, Financial Services and Capital Markets Union. European Pravda has seen copies of these documents.

In the letters, Pyshnyy warns the Europeans that their inaction and silence, in a situation where a member state is effectively supporting banditry by its own special services, could have dramatic consequences for the entire EU.

"We cannot allow EU space to be turned into a feudal medieval Europe," he writes.

In his letter to Lagarde, Pyshnyy also notes that such blatant violations create additional reputational risks for the development of the EU’s single market and may complicate plans to strengthen the euro.

Writing to the European Commission, he asks it to act as an independent third party to clarify all the circumstances of the incident objectively and impartially, and guarantees that Ukraine will provide all necessary information. He also stresses that "the institutional capacity and reputation of the entire EU" is at stake.

The letter also states:

"Such gross violations of established practices of international cooperation in the banking sector are essentially a politically motivated manipulation of EU anti-money-laundering rules. This directly creates additional reputational risks for the development of the EU’s single market and undermines trust in European compliance procedures."

Despite Kyiv’s arguments, Brussels has not found the courage to act.

The European Commission merely confirmed that it had received the letter from the head of the National Bank of Ukraine. When European Pravda contacted the press service of the European Central Bank, it took some time to consider its response, later replying briefly: "We have no comment to make on this for now, and we will get back to you when we have more updates on this matter."

This hesitation on the part of EU institutions may be connected to the fact that Brussels had previously decided to suspend all criticism of Orbán until the elections so as not to fuel the anti-European propaganda of Hungary’s ruling party.

But Hungary’s actions have now crossed a line. The EU should respond.

Regardless of what the EU does, Ukraine is preparing for a legal battle. Kyiv will challenge the clearly illegal actions of the Hungarian authorities regarding the detained Ukrainians. It is almost certain that we will see a lawsuit brought by the Ukrainian state or the state-owned Oschadbank in European courts.

It can also be said with certainty that Orbán won’t be returning the $80 million seized by the Hungarian authorities before election day, because doing so would mean admitting that Hungary’s actions were unfounded.

For now, the Hungarian regime, together with its Russian consultants, is going all in. By attacking armoured bank vehicles, Orbán has demonstrated that he is willing to cross unprecedented lines.

We may yet see new red lines crossed before the elections – lines that still seem untouchable today.

Sergiy Sydorenko

Editor, European Pravda

Tetiana Vysotska

European Pravda correspondent in Brussels