The Hungarian government on Tuesday welcomed an agreement with energy company MOL to secure the supply of Russian oil via a pipeline through Ukraine after Kyiv had previously restricted transit.
In July, Hungary and Slovakia accused Kyiv of jeopardising their energy security by banning Russian energy giant Lukoil from using the Ukrainian section of the Druzhba pipeline.
However, MOL announced on Monday that after concluding agreements with suppliers and pipeline operators, it had found a “sustainable solution” that would ensure the transport of oil to both countries.
As part of an agreement, MOL said it would “assume ownership of the affected crude oil volumes on the Belarus-Ukraine border” starting Monday. It added that the updated rules would be consistent with EU sanctions.
“We welcome MOL’s solution. It is a technological solution,” Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs told journalists at a state-funded think tank.
“But there remains the political problem that needs to be solved,” he added, stressing that Hungary has always been against using energy security as a “political weapon.”
In 2022, the EU imposed a ban on most oil imports from Russia, but the Druzhba pipeline was temporarily exempted to give landlocked Central Europe time to diversify.
Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban is the only EU head of state or government to have maintained close ties with the Kremlin since Russia’s large-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
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