Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban openly pushed back against US President Donald Trump, digging in his heels over purchases of Russian energy.
As a landlocked country, giving up piped Russian oil and gas would ruin Hungary’s economy, Orban told state radio Friday after a phone conversation with Donald Trump. The two leaders held the call after Trump had floated the idea of asking Orban to cut Russian crude procurements at a briefing with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
The Hungarian government will follow its own interests on energy purchases and need not accept the US administration’s guidance on the matter, Orban told state media. Cutting off piped energy sources would immediately cause a 4 percent drop in economic output in Hungary, Orban said.
“We need not accept each other’s arguments,” Orban said of his conversation with Trump this week. “We just need to talk clearly about our interests and listen to each other as friends, then everyone does as they wish.”
Hungary, a European Union and NATO member, has been treading a fine line between Orban’s allegiance to Trump and the close contacts the premier has maintained with Russia since its 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Friday’s remarks were some of the clearest so far that Orban would stick to the economic links with Russia even at the expense of a potential rift with the US leader.
Trump also urged Turkey to curb energy imports from Russia at a meeting with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday.
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