Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has arrived in Hungary, as both he and the Hungarian government defy an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant seeking his arrest over alleged war crimes in Gaza, Al Jazeera reports.

“We welcome the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, to Budapest!” Hungary’s Defence Minister Kristof Szalay-Bobrovniczky wrote on Facebook, alongside several photos of Netanyahu being received on a red carpet by the minister and a military honour guard.

Netanyahu’s invitation to Hungary by Prime Minister Viktor Orban has been slammed by Amnesty International, who said the move was a “cynical effort to undermine the ICC”.

Hungary is a party to the Rome Statute that established the ICC and has a legal obligation to detain Netanyahu on behalf of the court.

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