Hungary has blocked Ukraine from joining the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE), the secretary of the National Security and Defence Council (NSDC), Oleksii Danilov, said the previous day.
A European pravda source confirmed that it was Hungary that used its veto right.
Danilov said that a European country had refused Ukraine’s participation in the Centre’s work.
“There is such an institution called Cyber-NATO. And we submitted the relevant documents there last summer, passed all the verifications. Just like in NATO, decisions are made thereby consensus. Well, one of the European countries refused to allow our country to participate in this respected institution,” Danilov told the agency.
The NSDC secretary stressed that this happened despite the fact that Ukraine was at war and cyber attacks were constantly taking place.
“This is an EU country, these are our neighbours. They have denied us… One country out of all the members of this Alliance is against it. So are they partners in inverted commas or are they partners who are, as they say, sincere?” – added the NSDC secretary.
An interlocutor of the European pravda news agency, who participated in the process, confirmed that it was the Hungarian government that was blocking Ukraine’s accession.
The approval procedure for the Ukrainian application was launched in October, and if successful, Ukraine would have become a member as early as January 1, 2022. However, after a while Hungary declared it would block our accession.
The rules allow NATO states to revisit Kyiv’s application, and it cannot be ruled out that, given the current Russian cyber attacks on Ukraine, other members of the Alliance will persuade Budapest to reconsider its position.
“There is such an institution called Cyber-NATO. And we submitted the relevant documents there last summer, passed all the verifications. Just like in NATO, decisions are made thereby consensus. Well, one of the European countries refused to allow our country to participate in this respected institution,” Danilov told the agency.
The NSDC secretary stressed that this happened despite the fact that Ukraine was at war and cyber attacks were constantly taking place.
“This is an EU country, these are our neighbors. They have denied us… One country out of all the members of this Alliance is against it. So are they partners in inverted commas or are they partners who are, as they say, sincere?” – added the NSDC secretary.
An interlocutor of the European Pravda news agency, who participated in the process, confirmed that it was the Hungarian government that was blocking Ukraine’s accession.
The approval procedure for the Ukrainian application was launched in October, and if successful, Ukraine would have become a member as early as January 1, 2022. However, after a while Hungary declared it would block our accession.
The rules allow NATO states to revisit Kyiv’s application, and it cannot be ruled out that, given the current Russian cyber attacks on Ukraine, other members of the Alliance will persuade Budapest to reconsider its position.
But since the Council of the Centre, which decides on enlargement, meets only twice a year, Ukraine’s accession to this structure, even in the case of positive development, may not occur until the second half of 2022.
Hungary has not yet publicly announced its position on this issue.
It is noteworthy that this Hungarian blockade goes beyond Budapest’s previous decisions on creating artificial obstacles for Ukraine.
As we know, after the adoption of the education law in 2017, Hungary said it would block meetings of the Ukraine-NATO Commission at the political level and the procedure for Ukraine’s accession to the Alliance.
The NATO Joint Centre of Excellence for Cyber Defence is not formally a structure of the North Atlantic Alliance.
Ukraine submitted a formal request to join the Centre, which is based in Tallinn, last August.
The Centre has a major influence on the North Atlantic Alliance’s cyber defence activities. It was founded by seven countries and today has 20 members – 17 NATO members and three partner countries.
The uniqueness of the center is that military, civilian and government representatives work together.