Hungary has announced it will block an EU military aid package for Ukraine following revelations the “hostile” country planned to bomb an oil pipeline, according to leaks.
Government officials in Hungary were furious with Ukraine branding the country as “hostile” over the alleged plans to blow bomb an oil pipeline, The Washington Post reported
According to the leaks, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy was reportedly considering an attack on Russia’s Druzhba pipeline, which supplies Hungary with oil.
Hungarian bank OTP was also blacklisted by Kyiv, listing the firm as a sponsor of Putin’s invasion, enraging Hungrain officials even more.
As the Associated Press reported, senior officials in the Hungarian government said they are blocking EU attempts to send more weapons to Ukraine in retaliation for being blacklisted.
“We cannot support the allocation of another half a billion euros from the European Peace Facility for arms transfers to Ukraine, and we will not give it the green light as long as OTP is on this particular list,” the country’s Foreign Minister, Peter Szijjarto said, adding that the singling out of OTP as “scandalous and unacceptable.”
Szijjarto also blasted Zelensky’s alleged plans to blow up the Druzhba pipeline, saying there was evidence that “Ukraine is behaving more and more hostile towards Hungary.”
“We are all aware that Hungary is currently supplied with oil through this very pipeline,” he said.
“If no more oil were to come to Hungary through this pipeline, then Hungary’s oil supply simply would not be physically possible, not to mention that other countries are fundamentally dependent on the Druzhba Oil pipeline for their oil supplies,” he added.
“Therefore, such a threat is obviously against Hungary’s sovereignty because the security of the energy supply is a matter of sovereignty,” he continued.
“Therefore, if someone calls for Hungary’s energy supply to be made impossible, they are in effect attacking Hungary’s sovereignty.”
An anonymous EU diplomat responded to Hungary’s threat of blocking further aid to Ukraine, telling The Guardian the feud between the two nations has come at a critical time of the conflict.
“The timing is miserable because Ukraine is on the eve of a large offensive to try to push back the Russian aggression,” the diplomat said in an apparent veiled accusation that those in the Hungarian government could have a “much more narrow economic interest.”
Meanwhile, another official tried to downplay the impact of the move from Hungary, declaring the deliveries of European weapons would remain constant.
