Hungarian President criticised for edited post about Russian attack on Mukachevo

Early Thursday morning, Russia carried out a missile attack against an electronics factory in Mukachevo, Ukraine, just 30 kilometers from the Hungarian border, in an area of Ukraine populated by some of the nearly 150 thousand ethnic Hungarians living in the country. A large fire broke out at the site, which was still raging in the morning. At least 12 people were injured in the attack, five of whom are being treated in the hospital.

Hungarian President Tamás Sulyok reacted to the news in a social media post in the morning, expressing his deepest sympathy for those injured in the attack. However, less than an hour later, he felt the need to edit his original post, replacing the phrase “Russian missile attack” with simply “missile attack.” By opening the editing history of the Facebook post, one can see that the first sentence of the original version, published at 8:35 a.m., still contains the word "Russian," (orosz) but this was removed at 9:33 a.m.

Sulyok also wrote that it is in everyone's interest that the Russian-Ukrainian conflict be resolved as soon as possible. "I am confident that the warring parties will be able to recognise this and that, thanks to international diplomatic efforts, this inhumane and senseless bloodshed will soon be brought to an end," he added.

"President Tamás Sulyok should be deeply ashamed of himself!" Péter Magyar wrote on his Facebook page, adding that "there always seem to be new depths that can be reached". The president of the Tisza Party wrote that they had received the news with "deep sadness" and wished those injured a speedy recovery. He added that they hope that "being a foreign minister who cares about his fellow citizens, Péter Szijjártó has already summoned the ambassador of 'Russia, which never interferes in the internal affairs of other countries.'"

Klára Dobrev from the Democratic Coalition (DK) called the president’s act "shameful," and said that Sulyok's sympathy was just hypocrisy, “because in reality, he's only willing to associate himself with Viktor Orbán, which is the ultimate form of servility.”

According to Momentum, the change in wording is "a cowardly and pro-Russian move, and shows how low Orbán's foreign policy has fallen." The party expressed its sympathy for the victims of the Russian attack and wished them a speedy recovery.

Péter Márki-Zay also commented on the matter, saying that, just as it was done with Sulyok's post, "perhaps they could also remove the Russians from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs," a reference to the Russian secret service hackers having broken into the Hungarian foreign ministry's IT networks and having stolen a large amount of data in 2021.

Jobbik reacted more pointedly, writing in their statement that even though the president "tried to downplay the Russians' responsibility in this by removing the reference to the missile's origin from his post, the weapon was Russian nonetheless." The party called on Péter Szijjártó to summon both the Russian and Ukrainian ambassadors and to call on the two countries to end the war as soon as possible.

Foreign Minister Szijjártó wrote: "This morning's news from Ukraine once again proves that peace must be achieved as soon as possible!" His short post does not mention that he is commenting on a Russian attack. "Everyone must work with all their might on bringing about a peace agreement that will end the war as soon as possible! This is the only way to prevent further bloodshed and destruction," the minister summarized.

Political analyst Gábor Török also commented on the president's changing of his post. He wrote that this is "another gem that shows that digital illiteracy can exist alongside political illiteracy. What you remove from a text will obviously be the most interesting and most revealing part of it."