Hungary Rules Out Hosting Additional Troops Amid Ukraine Crisis, Top Diplomat Says

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Hungary will not allow the deployment of additional forces on its territory as the national army is capable of providing national security amid tensions around Ukraine, Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said.

"No, we have not agreed to that and we will not agree because we have already NATO's troops on the territory of the country, which is the Hungarian army and the Hungarian armed forces, [they] are in the proper shape to guarantee the security of the country. So we don't need additional troops on the territory of Hungary," Szijjarto told the Euronews media outlet late on Wednesday.

Earlier this month, US Defense Department spokesperson John Kirby said that Washington will temporarily deploy additional US troops in Eastern Europe due to the Ukrainian crisis.

In particular, a 1,000-member squadron would be moved from Germany to Romania to join the 900 US soldiers already present in the country. The first 100 US soldiers have already arrived in Romania as part of the deployment on Tuesday. Another 1,700 troops are due to be stationed in Poland.

Moscow has repeatedly dismissed Western allegations of its intention to invade Ukraine with troops it has allegedly been amassing near the common border, adding that Western information "hysteria" seems to be a cover for Kiev’s plans to sabotage the Minsk agreements on the conflict in the breakaway region of Donbas.

In addition, Russia has expressed concern over NATO’s activities near its borders, which it deems to be a threat to national security, as well as military assistance to Ukraine by Western nations.