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Hungary’s foreign minister wants to extend MOL’s exemption from sanctions against Russia for another year to allow the leading Hungarian oil and gas company’s subsidiary oil refinery Slovnaft to export refined products to the Czech Republic – reported Világgazdaság.
Hungary will ask the European Union to extend for a year an exemption from sanctions against Russia that allows the Slovakian Slovnaft refinery, part of the MOL group, to export refined products made from Russian oil to the Czech Republic, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said on Monday, at the press conference held after his meeting with his Slovak Counterpart, Miroslav Wlachovský.
Szijjártó stressed after talks with the Slovak Foreign Minister that the Hungarian oil company needs another year to complete the investment in Slovnaft’s refinery in Slovakia, allowing it to continue to move away from Russian crude.
Both MOL’s refineries in Hungary and Slovakia process crude oil from the Friendship pipeline, and Slovakia receives almost all its crude oil from Russia, but plans to reduce the amount this year.
Currently not just Hungary, but both Slovakia and the Czech Republic are significantly dependent on Russian oil, although all of them are committed to gradually reducing their import.
MOL chief executive Zsolt Hernádi told Reuters in April that MOL planned to use EU funds to partly finance the $500-700 million technological investment needed to convert its refineries in Százhalombatta (Hungary) and Bratislava (Slovakia) to partially phase out Ural oil.
Last year, only five percent of Slovnaft’s oil consumption was non-Russian oil, but this will rise to around 30-35 percent, or two million tons, by the end of 2023, according to the executive.
Featured image: Facebook/MOL