Deliveries of Russian oil to Hungary via Druzhba resume

MOSCOW. Aug 11 (Interfax) - Russian oil supplies to Hungary via the Druzhba pipeline resumed on Thursday night, the Hungarian Ministry of Technology and Industry said in a statement.

"Thanks to the intervention of Hungary, which took over the transit fee, it was possible to eliminate technical problems related to accounting in a short time in order to resume [supplies]. Thus, deliveries began yesterday and from the night hours, oil is again flowing continuously from Russia through Ukraine to Hungary via the pipeline," the ministry said.

Despite the interruption in supplies, domestic consumers "were not threatened by anything, as our country has enough reserves for several weeks," it said.

Earlier, Transneft reported that Ukrtransnafta stopped transit of Russian oil through Ukraine on August 4 due to failure to pay transit fees. It was noted that the funds paid on July 22 for transit in August were returned to Transneft's account on July 28 as EU regulation 2022/1269 came into force.

Hungary's MOL and Slovakia's Slovnaft (also part of the MOL group) have initiated discussions with the Ukrainian and Russian sides on the possibility of MOL or Slovnaft paying the transit fee, which would allow oil supplies to be restored.

Slovnaft reported on Wednesday that it had resumed supplies to Slovakia.