Tusk: Lithuania asked to exclude Hungary from NATO over leaks

By Ahmet Taş | Wise News Press

WARSAW, POLAND — Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk revealed that Lithuania requested Hungary's exclusion from a NATO meeting in 2019 over concerns that classified information was being passed to Moscow.

The revelation comes amid growing distrust within European alliances, following admissions by Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto that he regularly briefed Russia about closed-door European Union discussions.

Information leak admission

According to a weekend report by The Washington Post, Szijjarto shared details with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, during breaks in EU meetings. Tusk condemned the actions on the social media platform X, describing the confirmation of systematic briefings to Moscow as an "absolute scandal."

The Polish prime minister noted that the news did not surprise him. Even before the leaks were confirmed, Tusk had warned on March 22 that Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s team might be relaying EU Council details to Russia, citing it as a primary reason he limits his own speech during such meetings to absolute necessities.

Szijjarto initially dismissed the leak reports as "fake news." However, The Associated Press reported that the Hungarian foreign minister later admitted to meeting with officials from non-EU countries, including Russia, the United States, Turkey, and Israel, around ministerial gatherings, calling the diplomatic practice "absolutely natural."

Long-standing security concerns

Speaking to reporters ahead of a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Tusk emphasized that objections regarding Hungary's reliability have been raised by multiple sources for years. He recalled that Lithuania sought to exclude the Hungarian delegation from a NATO gathering as early as 2019, specifically citing suspicions that highly classified intelligence could be transferred to Moscow.

Echoing these operational security concerns, former Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis told the country's public broadcaster on Monday that organizers actively tried to exclude Hungarian representatives from sensitive discussions during the 2023 NATO summit in Vilnius.

Despite these claims, Vytautas Leskevicius, who served as Lithuania’s NATO ambassador from 2015 to 2020, told Reuters he did not remember a formal request for Hungary's exclusion as suggested by Tusk.

Orban orders investigation

Moscow has not officially commented on the allegations regarding the European briefings. Meanwhile, Reuters reported that Prime Minister Orban has ordered an investigation into the matter, suggesting instead that his foreign minister had been wiretapped.

www.wisenewspress.com