In answer to the journalist’s question about what he thought regarding Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s death threat issued on Thursday, Mr Orbán said “I don’t think it’s about me, it’s about Hungary.”
“There is a tense situation indeed, the Ukrainians have imposed an oil blockade on Hungary. We’re working on warding it off, and we must break this oil blockade under any circumstances. We can’t come to an agreement with the Ukrainians on this because they’re blackmailing us and want to coerce us,” the Prime Minister stressed.
He added: “we, on the other hand, want to show them that Hungary cannot be blackmailed and cannot be coerced.”
He said the oil that must come through Ukraine and the Druzhba pipeline is “ours” and the Ukrainians have an obligation to let it through. “They’re not doing us a favour, they can’t bargain about this, this is their obligation on the basis of the contract concluded with the European Union,” the Prime Minister pointed out.
Mr Orbán stressed that he would deploy any means necessary in order to break the oil blockade.
“I’m deploying financial means, not military ones, naturally, because we’re on the side of peace, but I’m going to deploy all possible political means in order to protect the livelihoods of Hungarian families,” he added.
The Prime Minister pointed out that this was not foreign policy; energy is internal policy, it affects the budget of every family, “this is a crucial matter for the pocket.”
“If we don’t protect ourselves against the Ukrainian blackmail, the Hungarians will pay the price, and therefore, we will protect ourselves, and […] will break the oil blockade, I cannot be deterred from this with any threat, not even with death threats,” Mr Orbán laid down.
