Szabolcs also noted that one of Orban’s closest associates also met with the head of the FSB, Russia’s intelligence service, around the same time. The purpose of that meeting was to begin discussions of a mutually beneficial economic relationship—not between the two nations, but between the two political parties, Fidesz and United Russia. “So Orban established his contacts both with Putin on a formal level, and the underworld—the economic underworld,” Szabolcs said.
