By Kate Abnett and Marta Fiorin
STRASBOURG (Reuters) – The European Parliament’s organising body will discuss how the institution will engage with Hungary while it holds the EU’s rotating presidency, the head of the bloc’s legislature said on Tuesday, following criticism of Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
Orban drew rebukes from other European Union countries and leaders for recent surprise visits to Russia and China on a self-styled “peace mission” to end the war in Ukraine, days after Hungary assumed the EU’s rotating presidency on July 1.
The country with the presidency is responsible for organising the 27 EU member states’ meetings and negotiations with the EU parliament on new policies and laws.
A group of 63 European lawmakers said on Tuesday Orban had deliberately implied he was acting on behalf of the entire EU when he visited Moscow and Beijing.
“Attacks from pro-war European politicians only strengthen Hungary’s resolve for its peace mission, emphasizing that peace, not war, is key to a great Europe,” Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijarto said in a statement posted on X on Tuesday by Orban’s spokesperson.
Roberta Metsola, president of the EU Parliament, said the legislature’s conference of presidents – the body that oversees relations with member countries – had already discussed how to interact with Hungary in the wake of the EU criticism, and would do so again.
“It will be discussed, I’m sure, again in the new conference of presidents in order to see how this institution, as co-legislator… will engage with the presidency on legislative initiatives, on big decisions,” Metsola told Reuters in an interview.
The 720-member European Parliament opened its five-year term on Tuesday, following EU elections last month.
Metsola, a Maltese lawmaker with a track record of staunch support for Ukraine, was approved with a large majority for a second term as head of the parliament, in a vote on Tuesday.
The next term may see a more fractured EU assembly, with increased numbers of far-right lawmakers, and opposing socialist and Green lawmakers who have vowed not to cooperate with the far-right.
Metsola said she would work in her second term to defuse the polarising rhetoric seen during the EU election campaign.
(Reporting by Kate Abnett, Marta Fiorin; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
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