Hungary plans to block an EU sanctions package targeting Moscow and major new loans intended for Kyiv unless oil shipments resume through the Druzhba pipeline crossing western Ukraine.
“At tomorrow’s Foreign Affairs Council, the EU aims to adopt the 20th sanctions package. Hungary will block it,” Hungarian Foreign Peter Szijjarto wrote on Sunday through his account X. “Until Ukraine resumes oil transit to Hungary and Slovakia via the Druzhba pipeline, we will not allow decisions important to Kyiv to move forward.”
The remarks follow the declaration on Saturday by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban that he would not allow “any war loan” to go to Ukraine until crude deliveries to Hungary restart, Bloomberg reported.
The Russian military damaged the Druzhba pipeline system, which is used to transport Russian crude to Hungary and Slovakia through Ukraine, in an attack in late January, the news outlet said. While neither Hungary nor Slovakia have criticized the Kremlin for damaging the pipeline, the two nations have accused Ukraine of slow-walking repairs and suspended exports and diesel and electricity to the war-torn nation, Bloomberg said.
EU officials had planned to adopt the new bloc-wide sanctions before the Russo-Ukrainian War’s four-year anniversary on Tuesday, according to a report by the Financial Times.
The planned sanctions package includes a potential ban on providing maritime services to ships transporting Russian oil, a strengthening of existing restrictions to prevent Moscow from exploiting trade and commerce in Kyrgyzstan and other countries, and a proposed prohibition of all crypto transactions linked to Russia, the FT said.
Hungary has previously blocked sanctions packages and threatened aid for Ukraine to exact concessions from the EU, the newspaper said. EU diplomats are still hopeful that the bloc will approve the new raft of sanctions by Tuesday, when European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen is slated to travel to Kyiv.
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