Hungary returns seized Oschadbank cash and gold

What did Hungary's handover of seized Oschadbank assets mean for relations with Kyiv? On 6 May 2026, Ukraine's president announced that Hungary had returned the cash and gold taken from Ukraine's Oschadbank.

The assets had been seized earlier. Viktor Orbán, then the outgoing Hungarian prime minister, had ordered the government to keep the cash and gold for 60 days. The announcement on 6 May said the money and gold had now been sent back.

The return was reported as a development in Hungary–Ukraine relations.

Parliament backs a special tribunal

Five days earlier, on 1 May 2026, the European Parliament adopted a resolution supporting the establishment of a special tribunal to prosecute Russian leaders for crimes related to the war in Ukraine. The resolution also called for sanctions to remain in place until a peace agreement is fully implemented.

The proposed body is the Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine. It is conceived as an ad hoc international criminal tribunal aimed at prosecuting individuals responsible for the Russian invasion under the legal concept of crimes of aggression. It would complement the existing International Criminal Court investigation in Ukraine.

The invasion has been described as violating international law since its beginning, and has also been called a crime of aggression under international criminal law. It has been described the same way under some countries' domestic criminal codes, including those of Ukraine and Russia, although procedural obstacles exist to prosecutions under those laws.

Two threads from early May

The two developments were separate. One was a bilateral matter settled between Kyiv and Budapest. The other was a political statement by the European Parliament on accountability and sanctions. Together they marked the early days of May 2026 as a period of movement on both Ukraine's finances abroad and the legal response to the war.