The foreign minister said the European Union should focus on peacemaking in Ukraine instead of sanctions that lead to nowhere and arms supplies worth hundreds of millions of euros.
Péter Szijjártó told a press conference during the break of an EU foreign affairs council meeting that the European Commission was already preparing a tenth package of sanctions against Russia and it was in an advanced state. Ukraine’s foreign minister who joined the meeting via a video link called for sanctions against the Russian nuclear sector and the proposal enjoyed some support within the EU, he added. Nuclear energy is essential for Hungary’s energy supplies, with the blocks in Paks securing one third of the country’s electricity consumption, he said. A contract was signed about the plant’s expansion nice years ago, he added. Experience from recent months showed that only those countries are safe from the point of energy supplies that can produce a significant part of their domestic energy demands for themselves, he said. ”Hungary refuses to support any measure that would restrict nuclear cooperation with Russia in any way,” Szijjártó added. Answering a question, he said that press reports suggesting that Hungary was planning to veto the EU financing of arms supplies to Ukraine were lies.