Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban posted a picture on social media of himself arriving at Moscow’s airport with the caption: “Peace mission continues, second stop – Moscow.”

The visit by Orban, seen as one of Putin’s staunchest allies in Europe, is the first by an EU leader to Russia since Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer's failed attempt to end the war in April 2022. It was slammed by top EU officials including recently appointed EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas. 

"I am grateful to you that you agreed to receive me even in such challenging conditions," the Hungarian prime minister told Russian President Vladimir Putin as the two men met.

Hungary will probably remain the “only country in the European Union that is keeping ties and maintaining the dialogue with Russia and with Ukraine”, Orban said at the start of their meeting.

"The number of countries that can talk to both sides of the conflict in Ukraine is declining. Hungary will probably become the only one talking with Russia and with Ukraine soon," Orban said, TASS reports. "I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to discuss a number of challenging issues and get to know your position in respect of [problems] important for Europe," he add.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, presidential foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov and presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky, who led Russia’s delegation in the 2022 talks with Ukraine,  also attended the meeting with Orban.

The Hungarian leader’s arrival and meeting with the pariahed Russian President Vladimir Putin instantly caused a storm of protest from the EU elite.

European Council President Charles Michel tried to call Orban earlier in the day when he found out that Orban was on his way to Moscow to protest, but no one in the Hungarian president’s entourage was picking up the phone.

Estonian Prime Minister Kallas angrily tweeted: "In Moscow, Viktor Orban in no way represents the EU or the EU’s positions. He is exploiting the EU presidency position to sow confusion. The EU is united, clearly behind Ukraine and against Russian aggression.”

But the Russian president welcomed the visit as Orban was swept into the heart of the Russian capital escorted by a full convoy of police, sirens wailing.

Hungary took over the six-month rotating presidency of the EU on July 1 and Orban has embraced his wider role by attempting to kick off peace talks between Russia and Ukraine. Only days after taking up his new mantle, Orban arrived in Kyiv on a surprise visit to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and called on him to start ceasefire talks with Russia.

Zelenskiy was tight lipped and refused to comment on the meeting at the time, but a day later told Bloomberg TV: "As for a ceasefire, I have been very clear: we are at war and we cannot talk about a ceasefire just like that." Zelenskiy claimed that Russia could use the truce to accumulate forces and resume military operations.

Orban has long been seen as a thorn in the side of Europe’s efforts to isolate Russia. He has refused to join the sanctions regime and Hungary won special concessions to continue to import Russian gas and oil. Orban has also objected to the multiple funding packages for Ukraine, including the four-year €50bn support package approved at the start of this year, again winning exemptions from participating in the deal.

Opprobrium was poured on Orban after he travelled to China last year and became the first EU leader to have met Putin in person since the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an warrant for his arrest for kidnapping children, ostentatiously shaking the Russians president’s hand in front of the cameras.

“As part of his peace mission, Viktor Orban has arrived in Moscow,” his spokesperson told state news agency MTI. “The prime minister is meeting Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia.” 

Orban claimed that he had been clear that he was in Moscow in his own capacity rather than in an official EU capacity, but EU officials said he had created ambiguity. The titular head of EU foreign policy is EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, although he too has no formal mandate to set foreign policy for the member states.

“Hungary does not have the mandate to negotiate on behalf of the European Union. I would never pretend. But I can explore the situation,” Orban told his state media, adding that he would update EU leaders on any potential for peace talks, which he acknowledged were “still a long way off”.

Borrell also criticised Orban's diplomatic move, saying Orban’s visit was an “exclusively” bilateral affair as the Hungarian leader “has not received any mandate . . . to visit Moscow” and was “not representing the EU in any form”.

European leaders are angry as they have worked hard to isolate Putin and refused to give him any agency in attempting to bring the war in Ukraine to an end. At the recent Swiss peace summit held on June 16-17 Russia was pointedly not invited in a meeting designed to refresh the international support for Ukraine and highlight Russia’s isolation.

That event attracted the attendance of over 100 countries, but only 57 were represented at head-of-state level predominately from Western or Western-aligned countries. Leading countries with real leverage over Putin such as China and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) boycotted the meeting due to the absence of any Russian representation.

However, the pressure on Zelenskiy to do some sort of deal is mounting, especially in light of the increasingly likely event of a return to the presidency by Donald Trump – who has vowed to “end the war in a day” – in the US elections in November. 

After the Swiss summit, Zelenskiy announced that he was preparing "three detailed plans" in the fields of energy, food security and prisoner exchange that will be ready “by the end of the year” and will be presented to partners and also Russia. These are parts of Zelenskiy own 10-point peace plan which he presented at the G20 summit in November 2022 .

Despite having the upper hand in the military conflict, the Kremlin has said repeatedly recently that it is prepared to restart peace talks on the basis of the Istanbul peace deal that could have ended the war in April 2022, but was reportedly shot down after former UK prime minister Boris Johnson refused to extend Western security guarantees that are a core part of the agreement.

On the day before the Swiss peace summit Putin again offered a ceasefire that freezes the conflict along the current lines but on the harshest of terms that take into account “the realities on the ground”. In effect he called for Ukraine’s capitulation and for it to concede all the territory Russia has taken in the last two years and more. And he repeated that the Istanbul format for mutual talks was “still on the table” at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Astana earlier this week.

In a new revelation, the Daily Mail’s Russia reporter Will Stewart, who specialises in gossip, reported on July 3 that Putin had sent his trusted Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev to the US and offered to “share” the Crimea with Ukraine in a backchannel offer to open peace talks by the Kremlin.

The demands were that Ukraine must completely withdraw from Donetsk and Luhansk regions, both of which are now partially annexed by Russia. But Russia would hand over Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station and the nearby town of Enerhodar to Ukraine. And he would discuss the possible transfer of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions to the control of Ukraine, Stewart reported. There has been no official confirmation of the report either by the White House or the Kremlin.

Earlier in the day Orban told Kossuth Radio that he would like to convince Ukraine and Russia to "embark on a long journey which may end in a ceasefire and peace talks".