Orbán's party outraged by "attacks" on Ukraine EU membership referendum in European Pravda articles

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party has expressed outrage over what it called "attacks" in European Pravda articles concerning the Hungarian propaganda "referendum" on Ukraine's EU accession.

Fidesz communications director Tamás Menczer claimed that European Pravda had "attacked" the Hungarian government's survey of citizens on Ukraine's accession to the EU.

He labelled European Pravda editor Sergiy Sydorenko "Zelenskyy's favourite journalist" and accused him of deliberately backing the opposition party Tisza, which argues that Orbán’s "referendum" results are neither objective nor representative of the true opinion of Hungarian society.

"It’s clear as day that Zelenskyy and Tisza are colluding with each other," Menczer said, citing Sydorenko as saying that Zelenskyy "wanted a change of government in Hungary because Tisza and its leader, Peter Magyar, were in favour of giving Ukraine EU membership." 

"The sovereigntist Orban government and the political community of the Fidesz-Christian Democrats behind it will defend the decision of the Hungarian people against every attack," Menczer said.

As the supposed source of Sergiy Sydorenko’s words about "Zelenskyy’s alleged desire to change the government [in Hungary]," Mentzer referred to a video blog by European Pravda (EP) from the EU summit in June. However, no such statement appears in that video.

Furthermore, in an article on how Ukraine should respond to Orbán's anti-Ukrainian actions, Sydorenko stressed that Kyiv should refrain from emotional reactions and public criticism and should cooperate with the Hungarian authorities as they are. Nor should it expect a clearly pro-Ukrainian position from the Tisza party, since a large section of Hungarian society is not ready to accept this.

"Of course, as long as Orbán remains Hungary’s leader, it’s impossible to bypass his veto on issues requiring unanimity. But what can we do? We cannot change the government of any European Union state by our own decision," said Sergiy Sydorenko in one segment of that video. He went on to say: "When Orbán is replaced, and we hope that will happen someday, we will be able to catch up and move forward toward EU membership."

The Hungarian government announced the final results of the vote, claiming that 95% of participants opposed Ukraine’s accession.

On 26 June, Orbán claimed that the results of the so-called "referendum" had authorised him to speak out even more strongly against Ukraine’s EU membership.