Orban Meets Putin as He Eyes Sanctioned Russian Refineries
(Bloomberg) -- Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban is meeting President Vladimir Putin as Russia weighs the sale of sanctioned refineries that have triggered concerns about fuel shortages across eastern Europe.
Orban told Putin at the start of talks in the Kremlin on Friday that he planned to discuss energy issues as Russia remained a “basic” source for Hungary. Orban this month secured, via President Donald Trump, an exemption from US sanctions on Russian oil. He said Russia’s war on Ukraine would also be discussed.
“We have extensive cooperation in the energy sector, which is very good,” Putin said. “And there are issues and problems here that require our discussion.”
Orban spoke a day after telling Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic that Hungary would be “happy” to take a stake in Gazprom-owned NIS, the Balkan country’s sole refinery. Serbia is facing a fuel crisis after US sanctions imposed over its Russian ownership effectively shut down NIS.
Orban’s trip to Moscow coincides with intensified efforts by Washington to secure a peace accord between Russia and Ukraine that was initially based on 28-points plan proposed by the US, but developed with Russian involvement. The US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to visit Moscow next week.
Orban has long tried to cast himself as a potential broker to end the war, though his self-styled “peace missions” have upset European Union allies.
“He’s traveling without a European mandate, and without consulting us,” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Friday during a news conference. “But that’s nothing new.”
Last month, Trump announced a plan to meet Putin at a summit in Budapest, but the idea was dropped when the US leader concluded there was little chance of progress on ending the fighting at the time. Orban on Friday again proposed Hungary as the potential site for talks.
The Hungarian leader, widely seen as the most Kremlin-friendly leader in the EU, is seeking to leverage his ties to Putin to potentially snap up sanctioned Russian energy assets in eastern Europe. They include Lukoil PJSC refineries in Bulgaria and Romania as well as the NIS facility.
Orban’s cabinet minister, Gergely Gulyas said the Hungarian energy company Mol Nyrt is in already in talks with Serbia to help it dislodge Gazprom’s ownership and resume fuel flows.
“If the Orban-Putin talks produce any tangible outcome, it could be the Russian president’s approval for Hungarian energy company MOL to acquire a majority stake in the Serbian energy company NIS,” said Daniel Hegedus, a political scientist who’s director for central Europe at the German Marshall Fund in Berlin.
The Hungarian premier also has close ties to Trump, an ideological ally, who granted Budapest an exemption from the US sanctions on Russian oil that are aimed at exerting pressure on Putin to end his full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Others haven’t managed to extract such leniency.
Bulgaria this month seized control of Lukoil’s local Neftohim refinery and its network of 220 gas stations to keep fuel flowing. Romania, which has a Lukoil-controlled refinery and a network of more than 300 Lukoil fuel stations, has drawn up legislation to allow it to do the same if deemed necessary.
Vucic has struggled to convince the US to grant a sanctions waiver as he attempts a foreign-policy balancing act between the West and Russia. He’s been hesitant to nationalize the NIS refinery out of concern about alienating Putin.
Companies from the United Arab Emirates are among those with which Russia is negotiating for Gazprom’s stake in NIS, Vucic said on Nov. 25. For the Lukoil stake in Bulgaria, a consortium of Azerbaijan’s state-owned SOCAR and Turkey’s private Cengiz Holding had been seen as the preferred buyer before US sanctions were imposed, though Mol also filed a bid.
Orban had dispatched Peter Szijjarto, his top diplomat, to the affected countries this month to discuss energy collaboration. Szijjarto joined Orban for the talks with Putin at the Kremlin.
(Updates with Merz comments in the seventh paragraph.)
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