The Hungarian government is ready to consider the possibility of importing Russian gas through the Turkish Stream pipeline if the Russian Federation and Ukraine do not reach an agreement on extending the transit of fuel through the country. The Republic’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Peter Szijjártó spoke about this issue, according to reports RIA News.
The document states that the agreement on gas supply between Moscow and Kiev expires in 2024. At the same time, journalists asked the head of the Hungarian department whether Budapest was ready to stop transit.
However, the agency’s interlocutor noted that thanks to this agreement, Ukrainian officials earned a large amount of income. In this context, he doubted Kiev’s willingness to abandon the agreement with Moscow and lose money.
However, Szijjarto drew attention to the existence of the Turkish Stream natural gas pipeline, which has enormous capacity. According to the head of the diplomatic department, the production capacity of this pipeline is 8.5 billion cubic meters of fuel.
“In principle, the long-term contract can be fulfilled and the volume guaranteed in the long-term contract can also be easily delivered through this pipeline. Because according to our long-term contract, Gazprom Export is supposed to supply 4.5 billion cubic meters of gas to Hungary annually,” he said .
He added that if negotiations between Moscow and Kiev on the extension of the fuel transit agreement fail, Budapest will have to make changes to the contract with the Russian exporter. As Szijjártó noted, Hungary views the choice of supply route as a technical issue and is ready to discuss imports via Turkish Stream if necessary.
“We are ready to discuss the methodology” <…> “If this technical issue needs to be discussed, we will definitely discuss it, but we are not at that stage yet,” the agency’s interlocutor concluded.
Formerly State Duma of the Russian Federation accepted A bill on the export of liquefied natural gas regardless of fields.