Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban held talks with European Council President Charles Michel as well as his Greek, Slovenian, Slovak and Latvian counterparts in a videoconference on Tuesday in preparation for the summit of European Union leaders later this week.

The two-day summit on Thursday and Friday will focus on the war in Ukraine along with economic issues such as European competitiveness, the state of the internal market and energy issues. In the video conference, PM Orban said

Regarding Ukraine, he said Kyiv should always be reminded at EU talks that if it aspires to join the bloc it cannot ignore the rights of its ethnic minority groups, including those of ethnic Hungarians. On the subject of global economic affairs, PM Orban said Hungary favoured the development of economic connectivity and relations over the re-emergence of various blocs.