By Alexandra Sharp
Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Hungary blocking Ukraine aid, high-level U.S.-Palestinian meetings on Gaza’s future, and easing tensions between Venezuela and Guyana.
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Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban arrives for a roundtable meeting of the European Council in Brussels on Dec. 14.Miguel Medina/AFP
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban vetoed a massive European Union aid package for Ukraine on Friday. The bill promised $54.5 billion over four years to combat Russian advances, particularly as Ukraine prepares for another harsh winter offensive.
Orban threatened to continue blocking the aid deal so long as the EU withholds billions of euros earmarked for Hungary, which have been frozen due to concerns about democratic backsliding in Budapest. On Wednesday, the bloc restored Budapest’s access to nearly $11 billion after ruling that Hungary had made substantial efforts to reform its judiciary—a controversial decision that some experts say is the EU folding to blackmail.
Yet that wasn’t enough for Orban to cave on greater Ukraine aid. “It is a great opportunity for Hungary to make it clear that it must get what it is entitled to: not half of it or one-fourth,” he said. Nearly $23 billion of the EU funds intended for Hungary remain frozen.
Russian President Vladimir Putin celebrated Orban’s decision. The two autocrats have long been close allies. But the EU is not ready to give up on aiding Ukraine. “I can assure you; Ukraine will not be left without support. There are different ways to do this,” Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas said, suggesting that an EU extraordinary summit in January could spark new solutions. Those could include the European Commission coordinating the collection of grants or EU nations supplying Kyiv with loans.
The unsuccessful vote comes as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is also struggling to secure additional aid from the United States. U.S. Republicans in Congress have repeatedly blocked the White House’s efforts to pass an emergency spending package that would provide Ukraine with more than $60 billion in aid, demanding that new immigration and security measures for the U.S. southern border also be included in the aid package.
Sending money to Ukraine “is more politically sensitive for Republicans now, with the momentum the anti-Ukraine faction has, and coming to Washington to ask for more money when they’re focused primarily on southern border negotiations just puts a magnifying glass on that,” FP’s Jack Detsch and Robbie Gramer wrote in Situation Report regarding Zelensky’s speech this week on Capitol Hill.
But Ukraine’s diplomacy efforts were not without some successes. On Thursday, Orban walked out of an EU leaders vote to allow the 26 other member nations to approve beginning talks on Ukraine’s accession into the EU. “History is made by those who don’t get tired of fighting for freedom,” Zelensky wrote on X, formerly Twitter, to celebrate the symbolic win. Still, membership remains many years away, and Orban has threatened to change his mind and block Kyiv’s accession efforts going forward if the EU does not fold to his demands.
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Who will be in charge? U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank on Friday to discuss the future governance of the Gaza Strip. “We do not believe that it makes sense for Israel, or is right for Israel, to … reoccupy Gaza over the long term,” Sullivan said. “Ultimately the control of Gaza, the administration of Gaza and the security of Gaza has to transition to the Palestinians.”
Both Sullivan and Abbas expressed interest in the Palestinian Authority (PA), which oversees the West Bank in a security partnership with Israel, taking over Gaza once the war is over. Hamas removed the PA from power in Gaza in 2007. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to advocate for Israeli control, with U.S. President Joe Biden accusing Netanyahu of not seriously working toward creating an independent Palestinian state and calling on Israel to scale down its ground offensive in Gaza.
Criticism of Israel’s operations escalated on Friday when the Israeli military said it mistakenly killed three Israeli hostages, having believed them to be Hamas militants fighting in Gaza City. It is unclear if the hostages escaped or were abandoned by their captors. The Israeli military claimed full responsibility and said it would conduct an investigation into the incident. Israel estimates that Hamas continues to hold around 137 people in captivity.
Meanwhile, officials in Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands arrested seven people, including four suspected Hamas members, on Thursday for allegedly planning terrorist attacks against Jewish institutions in Europe. The militant group has denied any connection to the individuals. Reports of antisemitic hate crimes in Europe have skyrocketed since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, with Berlin reporting a 240 percent increase during the first month of the war.
De-escalating tensions. Latin America breathed a sigh of relief on Thursday when Venezuela and Guyana agreed not to use force to settle their dispute over control of the Esequibo region. The 11-point declaration, signed during a meeting between Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Guyanese President Irfaan Ali in St. Vincent, did not make any progress toward determining sovereignty, but it did commit both countries to refraining from escalating the conflict, whether through words or actions.
This month, Caracas passed a referendum saying Esequibo was rightfully part of Venezuela despite international law recognizing it as Guyanese territory. Maduro has had his eyes on the resource-rich nation since ExxonMobil discovered vast oil wealth off its coast in 2015, and a looming presidential election pushed the autocrat to bolster his voting base by campaigning on new nationalistic fervor.
Major crackdown. Newly elected Argentine President Javier Milei announced a nationwide crackdown on street protests on Thursday. All four of Argentina’s federal police forces were ordered to clear demonstrators from the streets, and some protesters could face fines or other legal consequences for not dissipating.
The announcement follows Milei’s decision on Tuesday to devalue the peso by 50 percent against the U.S. dollar as part of proposed “shock therapy” economic reforms. Inflation in Argentina hit 161 percent last month, fueling rising poverty. But many in the country, including powerful labor and social groups, are opposed to his new policies and have called for protests against them. The new security protocols seem designed to repress any potential unrest.
Election season. Chileans head to the polls this Sunday to vote on a constitutional referendum that would replace its dictator-era charter with an even more conservative document. Its 216 articles cover everything from private property rights to immigration to abortion restrictions. This is the country’s second effort to replace its decades-old ruling manifest in a bid to combat public anger that motivated mass protests in 2019 over rising inequality. But it leaves progressive voters, including many Indigenous Chileans, stuck between a rock and a hard place: defending the existing constitution drafted under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet or supporting a document that they see as even worse.
That same day, millions of people in Chad will hold their own constitutional referendum. If passed, N’Djamena’s new constitution would consolidate interim President Mahamat Déby’s power. Several opposition parties have called for a boycott of the election. But with Déby’s coalition controlling the media, and anti-referendum advocates facing state intimidation efforts and financing shortages, the likelihood of Chad’s new constitution passing looks high.
The U.S. House of Representatives passed an $886 billion defense package on Thursday that will help upgrade the U.S. nuclear arsenal, fund weapons development—and provide greater transparency of government records on UFO sightings. The measure instructs the National Archives to collect government documents on “unidentified anomalous phenomena, technologies of unknown origin and nonhuman intelligence” and disclose them to the public within 25 years of their creation unless otherwise classified by the president. Maybe we’ll finally learn which of the hundreds of alien movies out there is most accurate. I’m placing money on Coneheads.
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