After weeks of protracted negotiations, Herbert Kickl’s FPÖ and the Austrian People’s Party have failed to reach a coalition agreement. With Kickl returning his mandate, Austria now faces four possible paths forward, including the prospect of an early election.
After speaking with both Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Donald Trump announced that negotiations to end the war in Ukraine would begin ‘immediately’. Meanwhile, Pentagon chief Peter Hegseth informed NATO defence ministers that the US is gradually withdrawing from Europe. These two announcements left EU leaders in shock and despair—but in reality, they present a historic opportunity for the continent.
‘The HQ MND-C’s role will expand in the coming years, and is set to coordinate NATO military exercises aimed at testing combat readiness and enhancing interoperability among Allied forces. It will continue to play a critical role in the region’s defence architecture, ensuring that the Alliance remains prepared for the challenges of the future.’
‘Jews, he noted, had been at the forefront of radicalism, yet after four years of senseless bloodshed, they were now viewed as exploiters and capitalists. Assimilation, he argued, was not a viable path, particularly in national minority regions…Therefore, Dohány advocated for radicalism while seeking to establish Jewish cultural life within it.’
‘I picked a character—for example, Klára Andrássy or my late father-in-law, Róbert Ligeti—and just wrote out their story. Then, I had the key dates. Then, I wrote out the next one. And then I did it date by date: what was happening in spring 1941? What happened in 1942? Therefore, some chapters cover a shorter time—in 1942 and 1943—and the main story is about diplomacy in trying to change sides. But in 1944, after the Germans invaded, there were many, many stories going on and many characters,’ Adam LeBor told Hungarian Conservative.
The large-scale restoration of Budapest’s Buda Castle District has reached another key milestone, with several historic buildings reconstructed to their original splendour. The government-led Hauszmann Programme continues to revitalize the city’s cultural and architectural heritage.
The Budapest-based Committee of National Remembrance (NEB) and the Krakow-based Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) held a joint event in Budapest, Hungary on 7 February to commemorate and recant the brutal atrocities committed by the Red Soviet Army during World War II in the two Eastern European countries.
‘Debates connected to the culture war, including even on such amorphous issues as the West’s slide into spiritual nihilism or the loss of its inner will, are directly relevant to international politics and even international security. Western strategic thinkers must take these issues into account just as analysts in Beijing or Moscow do. To do otherwise would be a potentially dangerous mistake.’
‘Hungary remains a major source of electricity and fuel for Ukraine and has carried out its largest humanitarian operation to date, hosting around one million Ukrainian refugees. Furthermore, the Prime Minister himself has stated that it is in Hungary’s utmost interest to always have a viable Ukraine between Hungary and Russia…’
‘The truth of the matter is that the Chinese will not allow themselves to be entrapped by Western and non-Western foreigners alike as they did during the “Century of Humiliation”. Xi is determined more than ever to have China emerge as the greatest power on earth, thus seeing the U.S. not as a partner but as an adversary that is equally determined to do everything it can to ensure he fails.’