New restrictions against Russia’s Gazprombank will hit Central European states, Hungary’s foreign minister has said
Washington’s latest decision to blacklist Russia’s Gazprombank is aimed at undermining energy security in the Central European region, according to Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.
Earlier this week, the US Treasury Department imposed blocking sanctions on more than 50 Russian financial institutions, including Gazprombank and six of its international subsidiaries.
The newly introduced restrictions effectively cut off Russia’s third-largest lender and primary bank for energy-related transactions from the SWIFT interbank messaging system, meaning it can no longer conduct dollar-based transactions.
“Including Gazprombank to the sanctions list is a decision that deliberately puts some Central European countries in a difficult situation, and deliberately jeopardizes the security of energy supplies” to several nations in the region, Szijjarto wrote on Facebook on Friday.
The foreign minister stated that any attempts to jeopardize the security of energy supplies to Hungary “either by imposing sanctions or by cutting off transit supplies are considered as an offence against our sovereignty.”
“We reject all the attacks of the kind against our sovereignty, resist the pressure, and pursue our national interests,” he said.
Szijjarto added that he discussed the issue of gas supplies to Hungary with the first deputy head of the Russian Energy Ministry, Pavel Sorokin, on the sidelines of the Istanbul Energy Forum, which convened in Türkiye on November 22.
“We reviewed the situation in the field of gas transportation and confirmed that we will support necessary cooperation for secure energy supplies to Hungary,” he stated.
Szijjarto went on to say that Budapest is also discussing the situation with the energy ministers of Türkiye, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, and Serbia, and constantly consulting with its Slovak partners to find a solution for securing energy supplies despite external pressure.
Russian shipments of pipeline gas to the EU were greatly reduced in the wake of Ukraine-related sanctions and the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, although EU nations are still purchasing record volumes of liquified natural gas (LNG) from the sanctioned country. Despite the bloc’s plans to eliminate its dependence Russian energy, it remains one of the world’s major importers of Russian fossil fuels. In August, pipeline gas comprised the largest share of the EU’s purchases of Russian fossil fuels (54%), followed by LNG (25%), according to the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA).
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