Péter Szijjártó on Macron’s Claim that NATO is “Brain Dead”

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: So, first and foremost, this is 20 years since Hungary has been a member. What take away do you have right now? What do you make of Macron saying that NATO is brain dead, and standing by the comment?

PETER SZIJJARTO: Look, for us, a country which had to fight lot for its freedom and a country which was occupied by the communists for 40 years and only been a member of the NATO for 20 years, as you rightly expressed. For us, NATO is the most successful defense alliance ever and NATO is a symbol of getting back the ability to have a free choice where we want to belong to. So, whoever says bad things on NATO, it’s a little bit with a kind of painful to us, to be honest. I don’t think NATO would be brain dead. I understand that there are debates about how NATO has been adjusted to the current reality. How NATO formulated or followed the recent developments, but I think saying that it would be brain dead is a little bit too much, to be honest. Some of my colleagues in the Foreign Affairs Consul, and I hope that you forgive me not mentioning names, sometime call the French president, who we respect of course because he’s the president of a great nation, as the American president of Europe. If you understand me.

AMANPOUR: You mean the European Trump?

SZIJJARTO: Yes. I mean, because some of my colleagues usually say, and not as a qualification, just as a description, that he speaks out of the box quite sometimes like your president does and he speaks very freely and indecently from, let says, former policies or from boxes or from, you know, habits or a political correctness. So, sometimes they are, let’s say, compared to each other. And for us, it’s really exciting to see when these two persons, the French and the American president, come together and speak out of the box, not according to scripts, not according to already prepared speeches. That’s always inspiring. Let’s put it this way.

AMANPOUR: Interesting. Because some of it is quite substantive. I know that Macron is very keen on a strong Europe. But Macron says that it’s about the political organization, the strategic brain of NATO. And particularly looking at what happened in October in Turkey and Syria. So, Trump and Turkey, Erdogan working out themselves without NATO partners that there was going to be a new reality in Northern Syria. That must concern you as a member of NATO.

SZIJJARTO: Well, look, to be honest, here we have a position which does not necessarily coincide with the European main stream. But maybe this is not totally new to you.