Hungary is investigating the sale of 108 armored personnel carriers to Serbia for more than €1 million
Hungarian Defense Minister Romulus Rusin-Sandy filed a report regarding a possible crime involving the sale of 108 armored personnel carriers to Serbia. According to Hungarian officials, the previous leadership of the Ministry of Defense may have sold the vehicles for approximately 500 million forints, or just over €1 million.
According to the minister, the previous leadership of the Ministry of Defense—headed at the time by Kristóf Szalay-Bobrovniczky—commissioned a company that had previously specialized in real estate appraisals to assess the value of the combat vehicles.
“Are 108 armored personnel carriers worth only half a billion forints?” the minister asked, noting that law enforcement agencies will determine “whether there was any misconduct here or not.” At that price, each vehicle cost just over 12,000 euros.
In 2024, Hungary sold 26 BTR-80s to Serbia after reaching an agreement with Rheinmetall that Hungary would replace the armored personnel carriers received from Russia in 1996–1999 as part of a state debt settlement with more modern Lynx infantry fighting vehicles. This involves the purchase of 218 such vehicles for 800 billion forints.
Some of the wheeled BTR-80s eventually became unserviceable, while others were repaired. Among the vehicles transferred to Serbia were APCs equipped with night-vision devices and modern communications systems; however, their technical specifications no longer met Hungary’s long-term defense needs, so a decision was made at the time to sell them.
As early as late 2025, Ákos Hadházi, then a member of the Hungarian Parliament, reported that Hungary had sold Serbia not the 26 BTRs mentioned above, but more—possibly 66. According to him, they were sold “at scrap metal prices”—“one euro per kilogram.” The MP’s suspicions arose after Serbian media, simultaneously with the Hungarian government’s announcement, reported that the Serbian army had received 66 combat vehicles in excellent condition as a gift from Hungary.
In light of this, the lawmaker filed a request for information of public interest. Initially, the ministry refused to respond, stating that it was unaware of the matter since the equipment had been transferred not by the ministry itself but by one of its affiliated companies. However, the court rejected this argument and ordered the Ministry of Defense to provide a response.
Ultimately, data released by the ministry revealed that Hungary had transferred 66 BTR-80 and BTR-80/A armored personnel carriers to Serbia, which were “surplus for defense purposes” and were in varying technical condition, though most were equipped with the necessary gear. The total value of the transfer was 935,000 euros.
This was reported by Telex.
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