Peter Sijjarto. Photo: Profimedia
The espionage conflict between Kyiv and Budapest has escalated, with exchanges of accusations, diplomatic expulsions and ethnic tensions in Zakarpattia. This was reported by Telex.
Hungary has announced the expulsion of two Ukrainian diplomats, whom Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó on Friday called “spies under diplomatic cover”. According to him, the diplomats worked at the Ukrainian embassy in Budapest.
This comes just hours after the SBU detained two people in Zakarpattia suspected of spying for Hungary. According to the SBU, the group was collecting information on the region’s defence infrastructure, socio-political attitudes and studying the vulnerabilities of air defence systems.
One of the detainees is a former Ukrainian soldier, recruited in 2021 and activated last autumn. The SBU stressed that the operation was coordinated by Hungarian military intelligence.
In response, Szijjártó said that the reports from Kyiv were “anti-Hungarian propaganda” and part of the “information war” waged by Ukraine. He also reminded that such accusations have been made more and more often over the past three years, stressing that Hungary “will only respond to official information”.
Relations between Kyiv and Budapest remain tense, in particular due to the refusal of Viktor Orban’s government to support Ukraine in the war with Russia and the politicisation of the situation of the 150,000-strong Hungarian minority in Zakarpattia.
