By Anita Komuves and Jason Hovet
BUDAPEST, Feb 25 (Reuters) – Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban accused Ukraine on Wednesday of planning to disrupt the Hungarian energy system, and dispatched troops to safeguard infrastructure, escalating a dispute that has undermined Europe’s pro-Ukraine consensus.
Hungary and Slovakia, whose leaders are outliers in the EU for maintaining relations with Moscow, blame Kyiv for an outage on the Druzhba oil pipeline that supplies their refineries with Russian crude pumped through Ukraine.
Kyiv says the pipeline was damaged by a Russian drone attack in January and it is fixing it as fast as it can.
Orban, in a Facebook video, repeated accusations that the Druzhba shutdown was for “political, not technical, reasons”.
“I see that Ukraine is preparing further actions to disrupt the operation of the Hungarian energy system,” Orban said. “Therefore, I have ordered the reinforcement of protection for critical energy infrastructure. This means that we will deploy soldiers and equipment necessary to repel attacks near key energy facilities.”
Measures also include greater police patrols and a ban on drone flights in some areas.
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
SLOVAKIA READY FOR MORE COUNTER-ACTIONS
Hungary and Slovakia, members of the NATO alliance and the EU, disagree with European Union partners over military support for Ukraine, which they say is prolonging fighting.
They have both argued with Ukraine over the transit of Russian energy supplies and are fighting EU efforts to phase out fossil fuel imports from Russia by the end of 2027.
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said on Wednesday available information indicated the Druzhba pipeline could be operational, and blamed Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for delays. He said the latest word from Kyiv was that it would not be restarted until March 3.
“The Ukrainian president simply probably believes that he can do what he wants, but he is very, very mistaken,” Fico said.
Slovakia stopped providing emergency electricity supplies to Ukraine on Monday and has said it was ready for more reciprocal measures. Kyiv relies on emergency electricity from EU countries because of relentless Russian attacks on its grid.
On Monday, Hungary also maintained a veto on new EU sanctions on Russia and a huge loan for Ukraine. Orban’s skepticism of support for Kyiv has become a theme of his campaign in a close-fought April 12 election, which he casts as a choice between “war or peace”, arguing his opponents would drag Hungary into the conflict.
UKRAINE SAYS REPAIRS NOT SO FAST
Hungary and Slovakia have had to release emergency reserves to supply their refineries because of the Druzhba outage.
Hungary’s MOL energy company, which operates Hungarian and Slovak refineries, has started ordering more oil through the Adriatic pipeline from Croatia. It has ordered tankers delivering Saudi, Norwegian, Kazakh, Libyan and Russian oil, which could provide supplies in coming weeks.
An EU spokesperson said on Wednesday Ukraine was ready to accelerate repairs on Druzhba. But Zelenskiy, in comments to reporters on Wednesday, said work could not be completed so quickly.
(Reporting by Anita Komuves, Olena Harmash in Kyiv, and Jason Hovet in PragueEditing by Alexandra Hudson and Peter Graff)
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