He said Ukraine’s President asked two things of Hungary and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. The first one was to vote for the extension of the sanctions to the energy sector and for Hungary not to buy gas and oil from Russia. His second request was for Hungary to allow arms consignments through its territory and to supply arms to Ukraine.
Mr Havasi said Mr Orbán rejected both requests because they are contrary to Hungary’s best interests. Hungary wants to be left out of this war, and so it will not allow arms consignments through its territory and will not send weapons to Ukraine. At the same time, Hungary is helping the people fleeing the war with every possible means, and is providing humanitarian assistance for them, the press chief underlined.
According to his information, by Thursday as many as half a million Ukrainians had arrived in Hungary, and Hungary had sent humanitarian aid worth HUF 2 billion to Ukraine.
Turning the oil and gas taps off would mean that Hungarian families would be required to pay the price of the war. Eighty-five per cent of Hungarian households use gas for heating, and 64 per cent of Hungary’s oil imports, too, come from Russia, the head of the Press Office of the Prime Minister recalled, highlighting that oil refineries can only be switched over to the processing of oil procured from elsewhere after three to four years of preparations, and the quantity of Russian gas currently used cannot physically be procured from another source.
Mr Havasi repeated the government’s position that Hungary cannot allow Hungarian families to be made to pay the price of the war. Therefore, at every European forum – as we have done to date – we will continue to reject the extension of the sanctions to Russian energy carriers, he said.
