BUDAPEST, Nov 22 : Hungary’s energy supply agreements with Western companies do not affect its contracts with Russian energy giant Gazprom, Russian Ambassador to Hungary Yevgeny Stanislavov said in an interview with Sputnik.
The ambassador recalled the words of Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto, who has repeatedly stated that “energy security is a fundamental issue of sovereignty for Hungary, which the country does not intend to abandon, and the Hungarian authorities will not exclude any reliable energy sources from their energy balance.”
“In this regard, the measures our Hungarian colleagues are taking to diversify routes and supply sources are their purely national matter and do not affect our cooperation, which is based on long-term contracts with Gazprom signed in September 2021,” Stanislavov said.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban previously said Russia guarantees Hungary’s security by providing it with energy; normal people won’t switch from a reliable supplier to an unreliable one. Gergely Gulyas, minister of the Hungarian Prime Minister’s Office, previously said that, according to IMF calculations, refusing to buy Russian gas would cost Hungary approximately USD 10 billion and result in a loss of over 4 percent of GDP.
In September, Hungary signed a ten-year contract with the American company Shell for the supply of two billion cubic meters of gas starting in 2026. Szijjarto said the contract does not cancel supplies from Russia, which provide Hungary with a stable base, but rather supplements them for diversification.
In October, the Hungarian energy company MVM signed a contract with the French company Engie for the supply of four billion cubic meters of liquefied natural gas (LNG) between 2028 and 2038. According to Szijjarto, MVM is also in talks with an American company about a contract to purchase two billion cubic meters of LNG over five years.
(UNI)
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