Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has travelled to France to attend an emergency summit of European Union leaders in Versailles on the war in Ukraine.
The prime minister is set to make it clear that Hungary was opposed to imposing sanctions on Russian energy. PM Orbán said at international talks ahead of the summit that the economic impact of the sanctions imposed on Russia over the war was high, but would have even more severe effects if they were to be applied to Russia’s oil and gas networks. The prime minister has made it clear that Hungary could not follow the example of the United States and extend its sanctions to those sectors. “This would be an unbearable burden for Hungary, so joining these sanctions is out of the question,” the prime minister has said. “We continue to require the gas and oil that is arriving from Russia.” Several other EU leaders and economic interest groups have expressed similar positions on potential sanctions against Russian energy this past week.
Photo credit: MTI