Hungary doesn’t even plan to discuss with other countries a ban on Russian gas supplies because the curbs would ruin the country’s economy, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Monday.
The minister made the remarks as he attended a European Council meeting on transport, telecoms and energy in Luxembourg.
He said he came to the meeting “with a clear mandate, whereby Hungary doesn’t want to hold talks on a gas embargo.”
“That would practically incapacitate our economy and the entire country,” he said on Facebook (banned in Russia as it’s owned by Meta Corporation, which is designated extremist in Russia).
On the issue of creating a joint EU gas purchasing platform, which was planned for discussion at the Luxembourg meeting, the Hungarian minister said: “We see no issues if the European Union is looking for new sources of gas, but participation in that can only be voluntary, and the member states may not be subject to any obligation in relation to purchases.”
Szijjarto also said the supply of Russian gas to Europe was significantly reduced due to serious technical problems with the equipment of the Nord Stream pipeline, which arose due to Western sanctions. Hungary expects the European Commission to investigate whether this is really due to the fact that the equipment that was sent for maintenance didn’t return from Canada. “If this is true, then we expect some action from the European Commission to ensure that gas supplies to Europe don’t end up in a crisis situation in the short term,” Szijjarto said. He said that the lack of gas leads to further price increases in the European energy market.
On June 14, Gazprom announced that it had to lower natural gas supplies over the Nord Stream pipeline as some gas pumping units weren’t returned from repair by Siemens in due time. The German company said it was unable to ship the units from Canada because that country imposed sanctions on Russia.
