Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Fidesz party will be asked to provide a written statement supporting Ukraine if they want to join the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), according to the group's vice-chairman Nicola Procaccini, UNN writes with reference to Euractiv.
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Procacini explained that this also applies to Romania's far-right AUR party, which joined the EU Conservatives this week.
"We have asked the AUR for a formal written statement on its unilateral support for the Ukrainian cause. Without this, joining the ECR group would not be possible because we have always stood by Kyiv," said ECR co-chairman and MEP Fratelli d'italia Procaccini.
"If, in the future, Orbán also wants to join the conservatives, he would have to do the same," Procaccini explained.
This week, new members joined the ECR, including those from the Denmark Democrats party, the Bulgarian party ‘There is Such a People’, the Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union party, French ex-Reconquête MEPs, and the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR).
With the emergence of new parties, the ECR (European Conservatives and Reformists) became the third-largest group in the EU parliament, ahead of the Liberal Renew party.
Fidesz and ECR met for several months, but Hungary's ruling party did not welcome the accession of AUR.
Fidesz will never share a group in the European Parliament with such a party (AUR). This is non - negotiable," said Zoltan Kovac, a spokesman for the Hungarian prime minister, referring to the extreme position of the Romanian nationalist party on the Hungarian minority in the country.
The ECR will elect its leadership at its founding meeting on June 26.