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Addressing the bloc’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, Hungarian FM Peter Szijjarto reportedly cited a recent Ukrainian UAV attack on the TurkStream pipeline
Hungary has accused the European Union of failing to honor energy security guarantees it recently gave the country, state news channel Hirado reported on Sunday, citing a letter sent by Budapest to Brussels.
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto reportedly warned the EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas that his country’s acquiescence in any further Ukraine-related decision would be contingent on the bloc’s ability to safeguard Budapest’s energy supplies.
The letter came hard on the heels of a Russian Defense Ministry report that three drones had been shot down near a key compressor station servicing the TurkStream gas pipeline on Friday. Moscow described the incident as a Ukrainian sabotage attempt.
In an article on Sunday, Hirado news program claimed that Foreign Minister Szijjarto had reminded Kallas that as recently as January 27, when the EU was deciding on extending sanctions against Russia, Brussels explicitly gave Budapest “four guarantees that Hungary’s energy supply would be secure.”
Szijjarto reportedly wrote that the bloc’s leadership had pledged to involve his country in negotiations over the resumption of Russian gas transit through Ukraine – an apparent reference to Kiev’s decision in late 2024 to terminate its five-year transit contract with Russian energy giant Gazprom. The diplomat pointed out that despite this promise, Budapest has been excluded from the respective talks, Hirado noted.
“Secondly, the European Commission also gave a guarantee that Ukraine would not attack the infrastructure responsible for energy transport to the EU,” Szijjarto wrote, adding that nonetheless, “Ukraine launched a drone attack on the Russkaya compressor station of the TurkStream on the night of February 28.”
The media outlet quoted the minister as expressing incredulity that an EU candidate nation (Ukraine) would seriously endanger the energy security of a current member state, with Brussels seemingly taking Kiev’s side and not Budapest’s.
The Hungarian diplomat made it clear that his country’s “position will largely be determined by the issues raised in this letter in the decisions regarding Ukraine in the coming period,” Hirado reported.
In a post on Facebook on Saturday, the official wrote that the inoperability of the TurkStream “would seriously endanger our energy security,” and thus encroach on Hungary’s sovereignty.
While Friday’s incident did not result in any damage to the energy infrastructure, a similar attack reported by the Russian Defense Ministry in January saw falling debris impact the facility.
TurkStream delivers Russian natural gas to Turkish customers and several European countries, including Hungary, Serbia, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Greece.
