Belarus has always been a reliable partner in the transit of crude oil and no problems with shipments through its territory have emerged, Péter Szijjártó, the foreign minister, said in New York, ahead of a planned meeting with Maxim Ryzhenkov, his Belarussian counterpart.
The dependability of energy supply is the most important issue for Hungary, and Belarus generally does not get the attention it deserves in this regard, the ministry cited Szijjártó as saying.
Szijjártó pointed to the danger posed recently to Hungary and Slovakia’s oil supplies as a result of Ukrainian measures to restrict Russian Lukoil deliveries. Thanks to coordinated action on the part of the Hungarian government, oil and gas company MOL and the Russian partner’s flexible approach, Ukraine transit deliveries have resumed, he noted.
“And we must not forget that the Druzhba pipeline runs through Belarus to Ukraine’s border,” he said.
Szijjártó noted that the volume of oil delivered via the Druzhba to Hungary in recent days exceeded 3 million tonnes, and he thanked Belarus for ensuring its continued transit.
Nuclear cooperation will also be on the agenda, with the expansion of the Paks power plant having reached “another milestone”, with soil excavation under way and concrete scheduled to be poured by year-end, he said.
Based on International Atomic Energy Agency standards, the Paks site is now registered as a nuclear power plant under construction, he added.
A power plant using similar technology was recently built in Belarus, and the engineers who worked there are now working at Paks. “The Russian contractor is continually transferring the freed-up workforce from Belarus to the Paks site. So, the investment can be expected to speed up significantly,” he said.
Global powers’ failure to negotiate is ‘nonsense’, says Szijjártó
The failure of global powers to negotiate with each other is “nonsense”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó said in New York on Wednesday. The purpose of diplomacy is to allow opposing sides to discuss important matters, Szijjártó said in a statement issued by his ministry. “It’s nonsense for somebody to be stigmatised and called out for standing up for peace or for diplomatic solutions and keeping diplomatic channels open,” he added.
At a meeting of G20 foreign ministers, he warned against initiatives to establish blocs, as in the Cold War, and said it was in Hungary’s interest to avoid such developments, given its history. Hungary backs fair international cooperation that is based on mutual respect, a system in which countries aren’t “chastised”, he added.
The whole world could profit if the principle of connectivity were to be adopted in the coming period, he said. Hungary’s pragmatic economic and foreign policy has made the country a “meeting point” between companies, especially automotive industry companies, from the East and the West, he added.
He noted that Hungary was home to all three premium German carmakers and five of the world’s ten biggest battery makers. “This shows that efforts to decouple the economies of the East and the West are nonsense,” he said. Hungary’s government is opposed to any measure that advances polarisation and that further restricts global free trade, he added. “We Hungarians are counting on the openness and wisdom of G20 countries, with whose support we can enter the era of connectivity instead of reverting to the Cold War era,” he said.
UPDATE: Szijjrátó asks UN SG to intercede to start dialogue between global powers
Szijjártó asked United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to intercede to advance negotiations between the United States and Russia in New York on Thursday, his ministry said. After meeting with Guterres, Szijjártó warned that the failure of the world’s biggest powers to speak to each other presented an “extraordinary risk” in terms of global security.
“We also know well that it comes with the risk that the world will be divided into blocs again and we could return to the nightmare that was the Cold War,” he added.
“I’ve asked the UN secretary-general to intercede in the interest of getting the global powers, the Americans and the Russians, to finally talk to each other,” Szijjarto said.
He added that an end to the Ukraine war would not be possible without American-Russian dialogue.
Szijjártó said the UN needed to take up its original role as a platform for establishing dialogue between countries that were on bad terms or in conflict.
The start of an American-Russian dialogue could bring “new hope” for global security, as well as the security of Central Europe, he added.
ekh \ ggl
Read also:
- Hungary lets Russians, Belarusians in the EU? Here’s FM Szijjártó’s answer – read more HERE
- Lukashenka sends his greetings to Orbán on State Foundation Day
I am sure Mr. Szijjártó has some great Politician Master 3D Chess Plan – however, Belarus is not a friend, it is a staunch Russia ally with a very telling record (as does it´s leader, Mr. Lukashenko),
Threat to Ukraine 2024:
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-calls-belarus-pull-back-forces-border-2024-08-25/
Threat to NATO 2023:
https://www.ft.com/content/9591a2a9-0823-4334-8b71-616107ad5f70
Nuclear weapons proliferation, anybody:
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-hold-two-day-talks-with-lukashenko-belarus-says-kremlin-2024-05-23/
Quote “the United Kingdom, the European Union, and the United States do not recognise Lukashenko as the legitimate president of Belarus following the disputed election” (in 2020):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Lukashenko
Let’s face it. Hungary has informally joined the Russian camp. Hungary’s allies now are Russia, Belarus, China, Iran, central Asian dictatorships, the monstrous dictatorship of Venezuela and any other dictatorship you can find on the planet. Hungary’s adversaries are all countries in the democratic world.