Last month Hungary’s Viktor Orbán shook hands with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky at an EU summit. It looked good but signified not much. Orbán is continuing to oppose the start of Ukrainian EU accession talks and to exercise a de facto veto over a €50 billion EU aid package designed to keep Kyiv solvent until 2027. The question is whether he’s holding out for the release of EU funds withheld from Budapest because of his insidious assault on the rule of law, or has simply thrown in his lot with Putin. The latter seems implausible given history (1956 comes to mind) and the large majority of Hungarians who still favour EU membership. But Orbán shares Putin’s taste for crude nationalism and for trolling western liberal sensibilities – as does the Republican hard right holding up a mooted $60 billion US aid package for Ukraine in Washington. If Ukraine doesn’t get this aid it won’t be able to defend itself or pay its bills.