But Hungary would be an uneasy venue for Ukraine. The 1994 memorandum, signed there by the U.S., U.K., Ukraine and Russia, pledged to respect Kyiv\u2019s sovereignty in exchange for its nuclear disarmament. But Putin\u2019s 2014 assault on Ukraine and the lack of military support from signatories rendered the guarantees essentially meaningless.<\/p>\n
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n, a close ally of Trump who has continued to cultivate ties<\/a> with the Kremlin despite Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, has not yet publicly commented.<\/p>\n On Feb. 25, 2022, one day after Russia attacked Ukraine, Hungarian Foreign Minister\u00a0P\u00e9ter Szijj\u00e1rt\u00f3\u00a0suggested<\/a> Budapest even then as a safe location \u201cfor both the Ukrainian and Russian sides.\u201d<\/p>\n Russian officials have tempered expectations<\/a> that any sort of encounter between Putin and Zelenskyy was on the horizon, and uncertainty clouds any potential choice of venue. <\/p>\n During an interview published Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron\u00a0suggested Geneva<\/a>\u00a0as a possible site, an idea that was quickly backed by Italian Foreign Minister\u00a0Antonio Tajani<\/a>. Swiss Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis confirmed<\/a> Switzerland is \u201cready for such a meeting,\u201d adding that Putin would not face arrest despite an International Criminal Court warrant for war crimes.<\/p>\n