EU is discussing plan to sidestep Hungary’s veto on renewing sanctions

The EU is discussing a plan to sidestep Hungary’s veto on renewing sanctions that boils down to not holding the biannual vote to renew them. Under EU rules if the sanctions are not renewed the measures currently in place remain in effect, although their validity then is open to legal dispute.

Normally the extension of sanctions against Russia needs the unanimous approval from all 27 member states, giving Hungary a de facto veto. Budapest, whose Prime Minister Viktor Orbán is sympathetic to Moscow, has used this veto on multiple occasions in the past to wring concessions out of Brussels to extend its exemption on Russian oil and gas imports by pipeline and other issues not related to the war.

Orbán has consistently leveraged this requirement to negotiate exemptions, notably during the March 2025 renewal, Budapest demanded the removal of nine Russian individuals from the sanctions list, succeeding in delisting three: Gulbahor Ismailova, sister of tycoon Alisher Usmanov; billionaire Viatcheslav Kantor; and Sports Minister Mikhail Degtyarev. ​Usmanov’s other sister Saodat Narzieva had already been removed from the sanctions list after she was falsely accused of fronting for the sanctioned business tycoon.

The European Commission has a nuclear option of invoking Article 7 of the EU treaty that can remove the voting rights from a member state on the grounds of not living up to Article 2 of the EU treaty, which calls on countries to adhere to the undefined “values” the EU is supposed to stand for. But as bne IntelliNews has reported, the EU is under enormous pressure and struggling to maintain unity on sanctioning Russia in the face of rapidly warming relations between Washington and Moscow.

As the legality of invoking Article 7 has never been tested, the EC is also considering several other alternatives. One proposal involves reclassifying certain sanctions as trade measures, over which the EC has full control and only requires a qualified majority vote by the EC executive for approval, thus bypassing the unanimity constraint, The Bell reports.

Another approach suggests that member states individually adopt sanctions at the national level, forming a “coalition of the willing” to maintain pressure on Moscow.​

However, all the strategies carry legal risks and will in effect undermine EU unity further by splitting the EU into pro- and anti-Russia blocs. Moreover, the effectiveness of national-level sanctions compared to a unified EU approach remains uncertain.​

The EC needs to adopt a solution before the upcoming July deadline for the next sanctions renewal, when a seventeenth package of sanctions is also due to be approved that will reportedly contain measures to ban the import of Russian LNG to Europe.

Hungary opposes Ukraine’s fast-track EU membership

As the next EU summit looms, Hungary is still being difficult, suggesting it is getting ready to veto Ukraine’s EU accession bid, while many other member states, especially in the northwest of Europe, push to fast-track the whole process.
Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs Peter Szijjarto confirmed following an EU Council meeting on foreign affairs on April 15 that “several participants” supported opening all negotiation chapters on Ukraine’s accession this year. He also cited what he described as an “impressive idea” from an EU Commissioner to grant Ukraine full access to the EU’s internal market before it formally joins the bloc.

Szijjarto stressed that any decisions regarding Ukraine’s EU membership would ultimately lie with the Hungarian electorate. “I made it clear that this issue can only be decided by Hungarian citizens,” he said, referencing the ongoing thematic consultation, a nationwide vote scheduled throughout April and May.

The European Commission clarified that early economic integration would consist of Ukraine’s gradual inclusion in the EU’s single market, conditioned upon harmonising national legislation with EU standards. The proposal forms part of a wider effort to accelerate Ukraine’s transition into European structures amid the ongoing conflict with Russia.

Despite the government’s opposition, internal political dynamics in Hungary are shifting. Peter Magyar, leader of the opposition Tisza Party, reported that among 1.1mn citizens surveyed, 58.18% expressed support for Ukraine’s EU accession.

The Hungarian government, however, has repeatedly cautioned against moving ahead without consensus. Budapest argues that any pre-accession integration could undermine the EU’s institutional framework by bypassing established procedures, especially in a context where Hungary faces significant diplomatic pressure to align with the broader European stance on Ukraine.

Szijjarto stated that Hungary “is under heavy pressure from nearly all EU countries and Brussels” to support expedited integration efforts, but reiterated that national sovereignty must prevail in the decision-making process.

As bne IntelliNews reported, Ukraine cannot join the EU unless the Common Agricultural Policy is reformed, simply because its agricultural sector is too big and costs are too low. The EU would have to dish out some €186bn in subsides to Ukraine under current rules and that would turn countries like Poland and Hungary from net beneficiaries of EU budget subsides to net contributors. /IntelliNews/