Hungary will use all political and legal means to prevent the adoption of the proposal aimed at banning Russian energy imports in the EU, Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Péter Szijjártó said in Luxembourg on Monday fol-
lowing the meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs and Energy Council.
He maintained that the proposal to ban Russian energy imports has no energy, professional, security or economic reasons, only political and ideological ones.
“No one in the world in the European Commission or here in Luxembourg is interested in what impact this proposal has on the security of energy supply. After this, no one should lecture us about EU solidarity”, he declared.
Szijjártó also objected that the package would be pushed through by the EU in open, gross violation of EU law, since “it is actually a sanction” requiring a unanimous decision, not simply a qualified majority.
He said energy supply is a physical and geographical issue, not a political one for Hungary, since the existing infrastructure is simply not fit for imports of proper volume if the delivery of Russian natural gas and crude oil is ter-
minated.
He went on to say that representatives of almost every EU member state have boasted that they had long ago eliminated Russian energy sources from their own national energy mix. “I ask then: Why is this whole package needed? The real, realistic effect of this package is simply that it will kill Hungary’s security of energy supply and, to a large extent, Slovakia’s too”.