Rubio to go to Hungary and Slovakia after Trump backs right-wing chief Orban

[ad_1] US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will journey subsequent week to Hungary, the State Division stated Monday, after President Donald Trump endorsed its right-wing chief Viktor Orban, who's trailing in polls forward of April elections.

Rubio will journey to Hungary and Slovakia, additionally led by a right-wing ally of Trump, after addressing the Munich Safety Convention, the place final yr Vice President JD Vance berated the European Union and championed the continent's far-right.

The journey comes as tensions once more rise between the US and the European Union after Trump mused about seizing Greenland from Denmark, a NATO ally.

In Budapest on Sunday and Monday, Rubio "will meet with key Hungarian officers to bolster our shared bilateral and regional pursuits, together with our dedication to peace processes to resolve international conflicts and to the US-Hungary vitality partnership," State Division spokesman Tommy Pigott stated.

Orban is the uncommon European Union chief to take pleasure in heat relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin and has typically resisted EU initiatives to help Ukraine.

Orban had deliberate a summit final yr between Trump and Putin which was scrapped as US officers turned satisfied that Russia was unlikely to compromise on Ukraine.

Final week Trump endorsed Orban in a social-media posting, calling the European Union's longest-serving nationwide chief "a real good friend, fighter, and WINNER."

Learn extra Viktor Orban’s vampiric presence in Transylvania

However Orban is going through an unprecedented problem in his quest for a fifth straight time period on April 12, with polls exhibiting him trailing the occasion of Peter Magyar, a former authorities insider turned critic.

Orban turned a hero to many Trump supporters for his hostility to migration in the course of the Syrian refugee disaster a decade in the past.

When Orban visited the White Home final yr, Trump granted Hungary an exemption of sanction on Russian oil and gasoline imports.

Former president Joe Biden had a way more hostile relationship with Orban, whom he accused of "searching for dictatorship" partially by muzzling unbiased media and campaigning in opposition to LGBTQ rights.

Rubio will journey Sunday to Slovakia the place Prime Minister Robert Fico has additionally discovered widespread trigger with Trump.

Fico's current go to to see Trump in Florida brought about a stir when Politico, citing unnamed European diplomats, stated that Fico had voiced concern about Trump's psychological state. Each international locations denied the account.