MOL CEO Hernádi: No damage to Druzhba pipeline, diesel shortage expected; Zelensky: give something for crude delivery restart

Zsolt Hernádi, the chairman-CEO of Hungarian oil and gas company MOL, said there was no damage to the Druzhba pipeline in an interview with commercial broadcaster ATV late Monday.

No damage to Druzhba pipeline, says MOL CEO

“We can say, in good conscience, that there was no damage to the Druzhba pipeline itself,” Hernádi said. After the outbreak of a fire following a strike, he said the Ukrainians had delivered 35,000 tonnes of crude to MOL to mitigate the problem. “At that time, there was no problem with the pipeline,” he added.

The Ukrainians told MOL deliveries through the pipeline would restart after the fire was extinguished, in 2-3 days, Hernádi said. When deliveries did not restart, the Ukrainians told MOL it was because a decision had not been taken, he added.

“Not taking a decision is difficult to call a technical problem,” he said. Talks with the Ukrainians, who say work is still underway, are ongoing, he added.

Crude, diesel, gas prices will increase, diesel shortage expected

Hernádi said most tankers were waiting out the situation at the Strait of Hormuz, and pointed to an immediate increase in crude, diesel and gas prices, but added that the global market impact of the delivery choke point was still “impossible to predict”.

Asked about potential supply problems on the local market, Hernádi said the interruption of crude supplies through the Druzhba had exacerbated risks. He added that there was a diesel shortage in Central Europe at present, with imports meeting about one-third of demand.

Earlier, much of Europe’s diesel would have come from Russia, but that source of supply was phased out due to sanctions policies from the start of 2025, he said. “Those policies weren’t thought through very well,” he added.

Oil blockade ‘political blackmail’ by Ukraine president, says PM Orbán

“The Ukrainian oil blockade is political blackmail by President [Volodymyr] Zelensky aimed to help [Hungary’s] Tisza Party to power,” the prime minister said on Facebook on Tuesday.

“Hungary will not stay passive. We will break the oil blockade and protect Hungary’s energy supplies,” Viktor Orbán said. In his post, Orbán shared recent remarks by national energy company Mol chief Zsolt Hernádi, who said that the Druzhba oil pipeline “itself” had not been damaged.

Hernádi said he had been informed earlier that a fire would be extinguished and the pipeline would restart in two or three days, but then “the Ukrainian side told me that there was no decision as yet to restart the pipeline … which is not easy to see as a technical problem.”

Zelensky’s reply: satellite images cannot show reality

Yesterday, Orbán released satellite images showing that the attacked pumping station on the Druzhba pipeline has been repaired and is no longer damaged. However, Zelensky continues to pressure Hungary and is blocking crude oil deliveries to Slovakia and Hungary.

Satellites can pick out the technical tanks—one large tank, split in two, which is what can be seen. The control centre cannot be seen from space. The pipeline lies underground. How on earth could Orbán see what’s happening with the pipe beneath the surface? I’m surprised by that, though anything is possible,” Zelenskyy noted in a reply to Orbán’s satellite images.

According to the Hungarian News Agency, Zelensky suggested that he would allow oil transit again if Ukraine received something from Hungary and Slovakia—for example, if they dropped their veto on Ukraine’s financing or EU accession. Otherwise, he said, he had no intention of feeding the Russian war machine with more money that Moscow obtains from crude deliveries.

He also said that nobody in Hungary or Slovakia had ever thanked Ukrainians for maintaining the pipeline despite the Russian attacks.

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