Trump team says ready to consider Orban's Ukraine initiative

The team of US President-elect Donald Trump is ready to consider Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's initiative to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. This was stated by Trump's future national security aide Michael Waltz on December 15.

In his opinion, hostilities should be stopped.

"And if some kind of ceasefire is proposed as a first step, we will scrutinize what that means," CBS News quotes Waltz as saying.

He also noted that Trump's team is "coordinating" with the administration of US President Joe Biden before his inauguration.

Earlier, on December 12, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, during a telephone conversation with his Hungarian counterpart Peter Szijjártó , confirmed Russia's vision of a realistic way to end the conflict in Ukraine. For his part, the Hungarian foreign minister said that Hungary's proposal for a temporary cease-fire and a large-scale exchange of prisoners had been rejected by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy (whose term of office expired on May 20), about which Budapest had been informed by officials of the Kiev regime.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on June 14 that Russia has always sought peace and is ready to sit at the negotiating table even tomorrow. This will be possible when Kiev withdraws its troops from Russian regions and officially renounces its intentions to integrate into NATO, he pointed out. However, if Kiev and the West refuse, the responsibility for the ongoing conflict lies solely on them, the Russian leader added.

The special operation to protect Donbass, the start of which Putin announced on February 24, 2022, is ongoing. The decision was taken against the backdrop of the worsening situation in the region.