Ukraine accuses Hungary of Espionage and plots for incursion

Ukraine has arrested two people who said they were part of a Hungarian spy ring collecting intelligence for a possible military raid: the first time Kiev has accused a neighbor of the EU of placing his interests.

The Ukrainian State Safety Service (SBU) said on Friday that it had discovered a Hungary Military Intelligence Espionage network to collect sensitive information on its defenses and the population in its western region of Zakarpattia, which is about 80,000 Hungarian speakers.

A man and a woman, both Ukrainian military veterans, were detained as part of the operation, said SBU.

The alleged network collected information on regional military defenses and evaluated local sentiment, including possible reactions to a Hungarian military raid, said the SBU.

Financial times could not verify information independently.

The Hungarian government dismissed Ukrainian allegations and expelled two Ukrainian diplomats, which he called spies.

“Completely unfounded anti-Hungarian propaganda is often used in Ukraine,” Budapest told Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó at a Budapest press conference.

He added in a Facebook video: “We will not tolerate this constant defamation (so) today we have expelled two spies working under diplomatic cover on the Ukraine embassy in Budapest.”

The rights of ethnic Hungarians to Ukraine They have been a long -term irritant between Budapest and Kiev, in particular about schooling in their native language. The Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who has opposed the EU military aid to Ukraine since the Russian -scale on -scale invasion of Russia in 2022, and maintained close relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, had accused Kiev of “Hungarophobia” and threatened to block the country’s adherence to the matter.

Orbán has often said that Ukraine was merely a “buffer zone” between Russia and the rest of Europe and that Hell He had to prepare for any scenario after the war. But some Hungarian analysts were skeptical that Budapest had reached intelligence to establish the ground for a military raid.

The figures close to Putin, such as the Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Medvavedchuk, who is accused of having directed a Russian influence operation in Europe, have recently amplified the idea for neighboring countries to participate in a free after the war in Ukraine. Medvedchuk told Russia Tassas in February that these “historical statements” were “justified” as “some Ukrainian territories had artificially joined the modern Ukraine.”

Hungary’s small right -wing party, Mi Hazánk (our homeland), said he would “claim” Zakarpattia in the event that Ukraine lost the war. The party leader, László Toroczkai, said he would promote a referendum in Zakarpattia to become a Hungarian “protectorate”.

The SBU said that the person who directed the spy operation to Ukraine “was a Hungarian military intelligence career.”

He said that the spy ring was commissioned to collect “military security information” in the region, seeking “vulnerabilities in the terrain and the defense of the region’s air and study (ing) the socio -political views of local residents”.

In particular, the alleged agents gathered information on what could happen “if the Hungarian troops entered the region.”

The man who was arrested is a 40 -year -old veteran military man from the western city of Ukraine of Berehove, who said SBU had been recruited by Hungary as a dream agent and put himself in “waiting mode” in 2021.

Later he was “activated” by his Hungarian manipulator in September 2024, said SBU.

According to the SBU, the alleged agents were commissioned by their manager to collect answers to questions such as: What will the military and civilians of Zakarpattia do if Hungarian troops enter the region? What military weapons and teams are available on the black market? How does the Hungarian population migrate inside or outside the region? What military units are based on the area? How many transport and combat vehicles are there? How many police agencies operate in the region? How well are they equipped?

An agent was observed seeking the location of Ukrainian military units and an S-300 Air Defense System.

The SBU said that the agent traveled to Hungary to report his supervisor, crossing the border with a document that showed his ill -patron sick father to a foreign hospital for treatment. These documents are necessary for men who leave Ukraine while under martial law.

The agent and supervisor exchanged information for cash meant as a payment and paying for new hires to extend the network of informers, according to the SBU. The agency said the man tried to recruit at least two people.

“When forming a network of agents, Foreign Intelligence expected to expand the range of information collection, including obtaining data from the front and front -line regions,” said SBU.

At a second meeting between the reporter and his Hungarian manipulator in March, the Ukrainian man received a telephone “with special software for covert communication,” said SBU.

The telephone intended to help the man to share information safely with Hungarian security services on vehicles belonging to SBU and military officials in the region, as well as information on the number of Ukrainian troops in the region who had been killed in the first lines.

The detained woman had also served the armed forces and resigned this year, said SBU. His job is supposed to have informed the Hungarian Intelligence Service on the presence of Ukrainian aircraft and helicopters in the western part of the country, as well as detailed information on his former military unit.

SBU said he took several phones and other tests from the two suspects. In a video posted online by the SBU, the man was seen with his blurred and handcuffed face. The Ukrainian security service shared what said that telephone conversations were connected between the alleged agents and their manager.

The two suspects are being charged with high betrayal and imprisonment perpetuating with the confiscation of personal assets if they are convicted of a court.

The SBU statement “seems too well documented so that the Ukrainians were blowing,” said an analyst who refused to be named. “The Hungarians have directed this for years: Ukraine was undone as part of a Russian strategy” and being rewarded for their help with territorial gains.