Crude oil to continue to come from Russia to Hungary

The government has reached an agreement with the EU to continue oil imports from Russia, yet the country needs imports from other sources to guarantee domestic fuel supplies, Gergely Gulyás, the prime minister’s chief of staff, said on an extraordinary press conference held yesterday evening.

He said the price increase of gas, electricity and fuel had begun a lot earlier, but “the fact that it has become this steady can certainly be attributed to the Russian aggression [against Ukraine] and sanctions imposed on Russia in response”.

He said that scrapping the price caps would trigger inflation the rate of which would depend on the average price of petrol and diesel. The government has maintained the price caps scheme as long as possible, Gulyás said. Even with the price increase, Hungary will be among the lower one-third of countries in terms of fuel prices in Europe, he said.

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Answering another question, Gulyás said that MOL had written “an entirely clear” letter to the energy minister concerning the safety of Hungary’s energy supplies. “This is why we could not wait any longer. We would have loved to maintain the price caps, but it has become impossible,” he said. Gulyás noted that while Hungary had managed to maintain the price cap scheme for 13 months, there were countries elsewhere in Europe where petrol cost an equivalent of 1,000 forints per litre. “This, if you will, we can call success, it is just too bad that it is over,” he said, adding that the government expected no chaotic situation to develop in future because “the option of imports would be restored”.

Zsolt Hernádi, the CEO of MOL, answering a question, said the fuel price caps had caused a great loss to MOL and was “a painful period” for the company. He said fuel deliveries to small pumps would be gradually increased.

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Source: MTI