Hungary Does Not Support Lifting of EU's Unanimity Principle - Prime Minister

BERLIN (Sputnik) - Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Monday that Hungary will not support the abolition of the EU unanimity principle proposed earlier by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

In late August, Scholz called for a gradual transition to majority voting in common foreign policy within the EU, and proposed to abandon the right of member-states to veto certain decisions.

"Germany is working very hard to ensure that the principle of unanimity in foreign policy is abolished and replaced by majority decisions. We don't agree with that," Orban said in an interview with Budapester Zeitung newspaper.

No matter how hard the dissenting countries try, they will not be able to put together a blocking minority in such a case, while Germany and France will be able to push through their foreign policy ideas, Orban said.

"Ultimately this would lead to the relinquishing of a large part of our sovereignty ... I made it clear to Chancellor Scholz that Hungary cannot support this initiative," the politician added.

Prime Minister Orban paid a working visit to Berlin on October 10, where he conducted talks with Scholz.

The policy areas, where the EU principle of unanimity is required, are listed in the binding EU treaties. Such areas include the common foreign and security policy, social security, accession of new EU members and other. EU treaties have been amended several times in the past, so there is a possibility that the unanimity voting could be replaced by qualified majority voting in new editions of the documents.