Viktor Orbán to skip European leaders' summit without goodbye

Published on 15/04/2026 - 16:53 GMT+2

Outgoing Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán will not attend next week’s informal meeting of EU leaders, according to several EU officials.

Orbán, who was decisively defeated in Hungary’s elections last week, is expected to remain in office until his challenger, Péter Magyar—who won by a landslide—takes office in May.

Officials familiar with the preparations told Euronews they no longer expect Orbán to participate in the gathering which usually sees goodbye token and ceremony.

Until his defeat, Orbán was the longest-serving member of the Council, having participated in numerous meetings since taking office in 2018.

The last meeting he attended was last month’s European Council, where the usually mild-mannered Council President, António Costa, sharply criticised the Hungarian Prime Minister for vetoing the European Union’s €90 billion loan to Ukraine, stating: “Nobody can blackmail the European Council.”

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