Brussels, 18/02/2015 (Agence Europe) - Energy Union Commissioner Maros Sefcovic said on Tuesday 17 February that he expected Hungary to involve the European Commission in talks on its new long-term gas contract with Russia. The issue of energy lay at the heart of the visit, that same day, of Russian President Vladimir Putin to Budapest for a meeting with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
“Ideally, the Commission should be part of the negotiating team. One of the key elements for energy security should be much higher transparency”, Sefcovic is reported by the Wall Street Journal as saying. The commissioner, who was visiting Bratislava on Tuesday, said again that, in the context of his proposals for energy union which he will unveil on 25 February, he would examine all options for ensuring transparency and the compliance of intergovernmental energy supply agreements with internal market rules and the EU's energy security criteria. His proposal for the reform of the decision on intergovernmental agreements (IGAs) will include compulsory consultation by the member states of the Commission before signing an IGA with a third country. “I think we should level the playing field a little bit to be able to share the information much more”, stated Sefcovic, making clear that the Commission's aim was to ensure that no energy supplier has a monopoly in any EU market and to prevent third parties from gaining an unfair or competitive advantage in talks with individual member states.
Strong Russia-Hungary links. On Tuesday, Hungary and Russia reached “political agreement” on gas supply, Orban told the press after his meeting with Putin, the main focus of whose visit was negotiation of a new gas contract to replace the current long-term contract between the two countries that is due to expire at the end of 2015. “We settled the problem. We reached political agreement, all that remains is to settle the technical issues. Hungary needs Russia. We want guarantees on the supply of Russian energy”, Orban said. “We agreed that we will take positive consideration of certain issues raised by the Hungarian side during today's talks and, moreover, agreed that all these questions will be resolved. This pertains to the period after 2015 and certain other issues concerning the use of (Hungarian) gas storage facilities”, said Putin, noting that Russia provides 80% of the oil and 75% of the natural gas consumed in Hungary.
Orban and Putin said, too, that they were ready to cooperate in Turkish Stream, the new Russian gas pipeline project. “Unfortunately, as you know, we were forced to roll back our South Stream gas pipeline project, although I suppose the experience and knowledge we have acquired together with our Hungarian partners along with the joint companies we created can be used for broadening the work with our Turkish friends as regards the so-called Turkish Stream. There are various options here and we are ready to discuss them with everyone who is interested in working together”, the Russian president stated.
Later, with the two leaders in attendance, Russian nuclear group Rosatom and the Hungarian Ministry of Social resources signed a memorandum on the training of staff on civil nuclear power. During a visit by Orban to Moscow in 2014, Hungary and Russia agreed a controversial contract worth €12.5 billion for the construction beginning 2018, of two Russian nuclear reactors near Budapest and containing a Russian loan of €10 billion. (Emmanuel Hagry)