ع
Hungary expelled 10 Russian diplomats on Tuesday after determining that their activities violated the terms of the Vienna Convention, according to Foreign Minister Anita Orban. The minister, unrelated to the former prime minister of the same surname, issued the decision through an emailed statement that described the conduct as unacceptable for members of a diplomatic mission. Reuters reported that the move reflects the policy priorities of the new government installed after April elections. Relations between Budapest and Moscow have deteriorated steadily since the leadership transition, with officials now aligning more closely with broader European Union positions on security matters.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry announced it would respond with measures painful to Hungary, Interfax news agency reported hours after the announcement. Ambassador Evgueni Stanislavov called the expulsions an unjustified and unprecedented escalation in a formal statement from the embassy. He added that the action qualified as extremely unfriendly and would prompt an appropriate reply from Moscow. The Russian side has not detailed the nature of its planned countermeasures.
Viktor Orban lost power in April 2026 after 16 years as prime minister, Reuters noted in its coverage of the diplomatic shift. During that period he sustained personal rapport with Russian President Vladimir Putin and consistently slowed European Union initiatives aimed at sanctioning Russia or extending financial support to Ukraine. Hungary under Orban also maintained purchases of Russian oil and gas despite the full-scale invasion of Ukraine that began in February 2022.
Most European Union countries expelled Russian diplomats in the months after the 2022 invasion, yet Hungary took no such public steps until this week, according to a Reuters review of diplomatic records. The last prior expulsion of Russian diplomats from Budapest occurred in 2018. The current action therefore stands as the first notable rebuke of its kind under the administration of Prime Minister Peter Magyar, who assumed office in May.
Earlier friction surfaced in May 2025 when Ukraine and Hungary each ordered two diplomats to leave amid competing espionage accusations, a BBC report from that period detailed. Ukrainian security services alleged that Hungarian military intelligence had operated a network to gather data on air defense systems near the border. Hungarian officials at the time labeled the Ukrainian claims propaganda and proceeded with reciprocal expulsions from their own territory.
Anita Orban underlined that the expulsions did not rupture diplomatic channels and that Hungary would sustain necessary dialogue with Russia, her ministry statement said. The foreign minister’s remarks coincide with the new government’s stated goal of reinforcing its role inside the European Union and NATO, according to accounts from Magyar’s office. Regional intelligence cooperation, including joint operations with Czech and Romanian services against third-country networks, has increased in the past year, a pattern noted in multiple Reuters dispatches.
