OREANDA-NEWS  If Ukraine agrees with Gazprom to resume gas transit to Europe, European sanctions will be extended. This condition was announced by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Hungarian radio Kossuth, RIA Novosti reports.

According to him, the republic is ready to sign up for the extension of restrictive measures and thereby help Ukraine, but wants reciprocity from Kiev. And her politician sees that the Ukrainian authorities should allow Central European countries to buy gas from Russia.

Orban also stressed that Ukraine should not "use any semi-legal and legal military means" to try to influence the last remaining route of pipeline gas supplies to Europe, that is, the Turkish Stream. And as a last condition, the Hungarian prime minister named the provision of guarantees that Kiev would not stop pumping Russian oil to Hungary.

The Russian Defense Ministry reported on the January 11 attack by Ukrainian drones on the Russkaya compressor station in the Krasnodar Territory, which is part of the Turkish Stream infrastructure. In Kiev, they did not comment on the information, in Europe they indicated that they had not requested Ukraine on this issue, and in Turkey they stated that they had not noticed any problems with pumping.

Earlier, Bloomberg, citing European officials, reported that Brussels was concerned about Hungary's position on anti-Russian sanctions. Their extension requires the unanimous support of all 27 countries of the association, but Orban, who has repeatedly blocked initiatives in support of Ukraine, threatens to refuse to sign. In the coming days, the ambassadors of the EU countries will meet to discuss this issue and the possible demarche of Budapest.

At the same time, the Financial Times claims that the EU leadership has a number of ways to overcome Hungary's possible veto on the extension of sanctions against Russia and the non-return of frozen funds to it.