Russia will return two Hungarian-Ukrainian POWs – Putin
Moscow has offered to return two Hungarian-Ukrainian nationals taken prisoner in the Ukraine conflict, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said.
The president announced the move on Wednesday when he hosted Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto at the Kremlin. The issue of the POWs was raised earlier this week by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban during a phone call, Putin noted.
“These are citizens who hold dual citizenship, both Ukrainian and Hungarian, and they were forcibly conscripted. I have decided to release two people. As the prime minister requested, you may take them with you right away,” Putin told Szijjarto.
Budapest has long raised concerns about ethnic Hungarians from Ukraine’s Transcarpathia region being conscripted by Kiev and killed in the conflict. The tensions between Kiev and Budapest over the Hungarian minority predate the Russia-Ukraine hostilities.
Budapest has repeatedly accused Kiev of violating the rights of ethnic Hungarians, limiting their educational options in their native language under the Ukrainization policies in force after the 2014 Maidan coup.
Kiev, in turn, has accused Budapest of meddling in the country’s domestic affairs, pointing at Hungary’s longstanding practice of issuing passports to ethnic Hungarians in Ukraine, which has caused multiple diplomatic incidents.
