PM Orbán disputes US Secretary Marco Rubio’s statement regarding Hungary’s sanctions waiver

The agreement on Hungary’s exemption from the United States’ sanctions on Russian energy is dependent on the top players involved, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in an interview to public radio on Friday, emphasising that the deal was a non-partisan one, and that even those who did not vote for the current government benefitted from it.

Orbán: Exemption from US sanctions tied to people at the top

Asked how long the exemption from the sanctions would remain in effect after the US secretary of state suggested that Hungary had a one-year exemption, Orbán said: “It’s the word of whoever is at the top that counts, and the president is at the top.” As long as Donald Trump is the US president and Hungary had a patriotic government the regulated utility price scheme would remain in effect, he added.

If any of these factors changed and a new situation emerged, “the utility price caps are done”, he said, emphasising that the exemptions were “dependent on the individuals” involved. “The bureaucrats will write whatever they write — it doesn’t matter.” Orbán said that without the agreement, the utility bills of Hungarian families would have tripled from the end of November, and the per-litre price of petrol would have risen to 1,000 forints (EUR 2.60).

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“This is good news for all Hungarians. I said back in 2022 that even those who don’t vote for us will benefit from us being in power,” he said, adding there was “no room for partisan debate in this matter”.

Hungary not paying for US sanctions exemption

Hungary has not paid “a single penny” for the exemption from US sanctions, Orbán said in an interview to public radio on Friday. “We have not paid a penny for this exemption because the President of the US likes Hungarians,” Orbán said. Since Hungarian energy imports form a tiny part of Russian exports, “they have no weight in disciplining Russia,” he said.

Orbán said he generally concluded agreements that were beneficial for the Hungarian economy “both as a package and in their individual parts”, and this was the case here, too. The first agreement on buying LNG from the US was signed five years ago, Orban said. The more sources Hungary has for receiving gas and oil, the more secure its supplies are, he said.

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He noted that Hungary has built many pipeline interconnectors. “For example, we have built the Slovak-Hungarian interconnector, without which we would be in much bigger trouble today,” he said. “Today, Hungary is a country which, while buying the majority of its gas and oil from Russia, has secondary, complementary options which provide security,” he said.

US financial shield unlike IMF loan

Orbán contrasted a financial shield the United States has offered Hungary, as “assistance for countries on friendly terms”, with an International Monetary Fund loan drawn by the former left-wing government that came with “serious economic consequences for Hungarians” in a weekly interview with public radio on Friday.

Orbán dismissed suggestions by the opposition that the financial shield, agreed on at talks in Washington DC a week earlier, was similar to Hungary’s IMF loan taken out in 2008. While the IMF loan came with conditions, such as the elimination of the “13th month” pension and wage supplements, Orban said the financial shield comprised 4-5 government and central bank tools, with international precedents, that could help countries on friendly terms if they got into trouble.

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He added that the “contours” of those tools were being shaped, and Hungary could call them down if necessary, such as in the case of a speculative attack on the forint.

Europe must turn from war towards peace

The risk of the Ukraine-Russia war spreading is a daily eventuality “because of the leaders of Western states where pro-war [leaders] are gaining space,” Orbán said, calling on Europe to “turn around and move towards peace rather than war.”

“The fundamental question is what is in Europe’s interest. My answer is that peace is,” Orbán said, adding that all efforts should be made to achieve that.

“Unfortunately, not everyone agrees with us Hungarians; many countries think that war is better than peace. They are taking an enormous risk by dragging Europe into this war. They are giving weapons, money and technology [to Ukraine], and are discussing whether and how to send soldiers,” he said.

He said Europe had to “rearrange the chessboard” and start moving towards peace to avoid “bringing the war into Europe, sending money away and ruining the European economy.”

“They have burnt through 185 billion euros, and are still planning to burn through further tens of billions, even though their money ran out a long time ago. They want to take out loans, so they would even plunge Europe into debt,” he said. “Our children and grandchildren will still suffer from the consequences of this bad, failed war politics.”

Orbán said that is why he was “fighting so desperately to get Europeans off the pro-war track.”

Rollout of 14th month pension underpinned by economy

The introduction of a 14th month pension and the increase of tax breaks for families with children are underpinned by Hungary’s economic foundations, and must be implemented even in the face of opposition from the left, Orbán said.

Orbán added that because long-term measures like personal income tax exemption for mothers raising two children and the 14th month pension came with long-term financial obligations, the debates on them with the opposition Tisza Party and the Democratic Coalition (DK) were open-ended.

He said the question was whether the considerations based on which the government made its decisions to introduce such measures were justified. “I say that our decisions are justified, the financial and economic foundations for these measures are there; they can and must be implemented even in the face of opposition from the left,” he added.

The prime minister said Tisza and DK were against the 14th month pension and wanted to reform Hungary’s pension system.

He said the government’s ongoing National Consultation public survey was about this very debate, irrespective of “the fact that … a party striving for power with Brussels behind it doesn’t want to reveal its intentions”. “The left-wing parties pursue leftist economic policies and favour tax hikes and dependence on Brussels. And on the other side there’s a patriotic government.”