BUDAPEST AND BRATISLAVA HOLD THE LINE

Thursday, 03/09/2026, 00:21.

Hungary and Slovakia used the EU's unanimity rule to hold up decisions most members support — within 24 hours of each other. Hungary stopped Ukraine's next accession step on Monday. Slovakia refused to renew the blacklist of sanctioned Russians on Tuesday. Under EU treaties, a single government can block foreign-policy and enlargement decisions even when the other 26 agree. One day after eleven countries demanded an end to obstructive vetoes, two capitals showed exactly why the demand exists.

Hungary froze Ukraine's path to single-market negotiations. Budapest did not reject Ukraine's EU bid. It stopped the Council from converting the European Commission's technical approval into actual talks on free movement of goods, workers, services and capital (European Pravda). Ukraine cleared the screening stage. Hungary froze the political gate that follows. Budapest says it wants visible progress on minority-rights commitments for roughly 100,000 ethnic Hungarians in Transcarpathia before any new negotiation cluster opens (444). Romania has the same kind of grievance over Romanian-language education in Ukraine — and chose to push Kyiv bilaterally without blocking the...