Hungary and Slovakia threaten EU with legal action over Russian oil sanctions

25 comments

1. >**Hungary and Slovakia have threatened to take legal action if the European Union does not start consultations with Ukraine over Kyiv’s imposition of sanctions on Lukoil and the halting of Russian oil supplies to Slovak and Hungarian refineries.**

   >Budapest and Bratislava stopped receiving oil from the Russian energy company last week after Kyiv placed Lukoil on a sanctions list. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed the decision to sanction Lukoil in late June.

   >Now the heads of the Slovak and Hungarian foreign ministries want the European Commission to lead discussions with Kyiv on behalf of the European Union, to reverse the decisions and allow for the flow of Russian oil through Ukraine to these countries.

   >Hungary receives two million metric tonnes of oil from the Russian group annually, around a third of its total oil imports, Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said, pointing to his country’s dependency on these deliveries.

   >“I spoke with the Ukrainian foreign minister yesterday, he said they allow every oil transfer through, but this is not true,” Szijjártó told reporters in Brussels

   >He added: “The Commission has three days to execute our request, after which we will bring the issue to court.”

   >The minister even went on to say that if the consultation procedure did not bear fruit, both countries would bring the issue to an international court of their choosing.

   >Sanctions – state of affairs

   >Russia has continued to supply natural gas and oil to landlocked Hungary and Slovakia via Ukraine despite the war in the country and existing EU sanctions on Russian crude.

   >Slovakia and Hungary have exemptions from oil sanctions to give them more time to transition to alternative sources of supply, as both countries are heavily dependent on Russian raw materials.

   >Ukraine’s ban does not affect other Russian oil exporters whose oil was still allowed to transit through Ukraine.

   >Source: PAP, Reuters

2. For what they will sue EU?

3. They can try, doesn’t mean it will go anywhere. 

4. For what? Support Putin’s aggression?

5. 🎻

6. Silly countries have not tried to help themselves over the past two years and just assumed that Russia would win anyway so they don’t have to seek alternatives.

   Time for them to leave the EU and plead to daddy pootin for help … oh dear!

7. What about sodding off for good?

8. Does the EU have a contract with Ukraine to supply stuff to Hungary and Slovakia? Why is this an EU matter?

9. Ukraine is not in EU 😂

10. Ukraine ain’t in the EU. wouldn’t it be better id hungary and slovakia started to talk to Ukraine?

11. Mentioning Slovakia is kind of dumb in this case, when the only slovak producer is Slovnaft which is 100% owned by hungarian MOL.

12. [removed]

13. Time for more sanctions on Hungary and Slovakia.

14. You had two years. Reap what you sow.

15. I would say that Ukraine should lift their sanctions to allow oil to flow. But there’s a war in Ukraine. And each day Russia attacks with missiles and drones. And it may happen that some drone will attack the pipe. Just saying

16. Ah yes, the dictators wanna argue with their biggest source of wealth! This will surely end well for them…

17. What you gonna do? Leave? Hahahaha

18. Ukraine got them by the balls 👏

19. I don’t see the point in keeping pandering to them. Their only real threat implied in every action is “siding with russia for realsies” — which they already do. And even if they didn’t, isn’t it sick that any country argues for it’s position by threatening to side with a war crime factory?

20. You cozy up to a fascist dictator you get the horns. Deal with it.

21. They could threaten to leave the EU… and then do it..

22. I personally support Ukraine in the fight against Russia. But I will write how it really looks from Slovakia:

    Slovakia exports diesel to Ukraine because Ukraine has destroyed refineries. Slovakia also exports electricity to Ukraine.

    I don’t know how this situation will help them… In any case, I think that Ukraine should have consulted Slovakia about its actions in advance, as long as they want to have good relations with their neighbors.

    Slovakia has enough of its own problems. We have a huge number of refugees from Ukraine here, and not all of them are doing well. This is of course normal, but especially people who work physically see them as competition. And some Ukrainians brought here with them the “Russian” culture of behavior, to which people here are quite allergic.

23. Get bend

24. Ahahahahahahahahahaha _breathes in_ AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

25. Alright, good luck with that