At the center of these talks will be renewed U.S. pressure on Hungary and Slovakia to urgently cut off Russian oil — Trump’s latest move in his efforts to pressure Russia to end its war in Ukraine.
“There is a network that opposes war in the world, with two focal points: one of power led by the US president and one of spirit that is here with the Holy Father,” Viktor Orban said Monday after meeting Pope Leo at the Vatican. “We draw strength, motivation and blessing from both,” the Hungarian prime minister said. If his ally in the White House, US President Donald Trump, had any idea, his thoughts might have turned to a difficult meeting that awaits him in Washington next week. The man whom Trump has called a “great leader” and who has long commanded admiration in MAGA circles suddenly finds himself in an unusual position – at odds with the US president on a matter of critical importance.
At the center of these talks will be renewed U.S. pressure on Hungary and Slovakia to urgently cut off Russian oil – Trump’s latest move in his efforts to pressure Russia to end its war on Ukraine.
Asked recently whether Trump had gone too far in imposing sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Orban said “from a Hungarian point of view, yes.” Orban has used his country’s heavy dependence on Russian oil and gas to advance his agenda in several ways. He has used it as a weapon to attack Brussels, as a means to maintain his good relations with Moscow, and as a platform on which he hopes to win re-election in Hungary next April. He has promised voters “free Russian energy.” Orban will enter this election portraying himself as a safe pair of hands in an increasingly uncertain world. But Orban is lagging behind in most public opinion polls, after his government was shaken by the meteoric rise of the leader of the opposition Tisza party, Peter Magyar.
The Hungarian prime minister has also been angered by repeated Ukrainian drone attacks on the Druzhba pipeline this summer, which temporarily cut off supplies to his country. Senior Hungarian officials have been suggesting for months that they believe the war in Ukraine could be over by the end of the year — a seemingly absurd claim, until news broke earlier this month of a planned summit in Budapest between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
But Orbán’s carefully laid plans began to unravel on October 21, when the White House announced that the summit had been canceled.
Orban’s government had been secretly working on plans for the summit for months. Balazs Orban, Orban’s political director (no family connection), enjoys close ties to US Vice President JD Vance and is believed to have played a key role. Orban hopes to persuade Trump to ease pressure on Hungary at least until the election, when the two meet in Washington next week. The Hungarian government appears to be banking on the idea that Trump is fed up with the war in Ukraine and wants to turn his back on it if a deal is not reached soon. Orban has strongly opposed Western military and financial support for Ukraine and rules out Ukraine joining NATO and the EU. He portrays Trump as a peace-loving president, dismissing what he sees as the EU’s warmongers.
The highlight of the canceled summit in Budapest would have been the moment when he appeared on the balcony of the Carmelite Monastery on Castle Hill, overlooking the Danube, accompanied by Presidents Trump and Putin. How could Hungarians vote against such an internationally successful leader, he might have asked.
On Monday in Rome, despite US objections, Orban insisted that the summit would happen – it was just a matter of time. Over the weekend, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov quietly suggested the same. Under US pressure, will Orban follow the Czech example? The biggest problem fraying US-Hungarian relations is oil. In 2024, Hungary even increased the amount of oil it receives from Russia via the Druzhba (Friendship) pipeline. On October 23, just as Orban was addressing a rally of his supporters outside Parliament in Budapest, the US announced sanctions on two giant Russian oil companies, Lukoil and Rosneft. Hungary received 64% of its oil via the Friendship pipeline from Russia, via Belarus and Ukraine, in 2020. By 2024, that figure had reached 80%, or 5 million tons per year.
The Hungarian government argues that overland pipelines are the cheapest way to get oil and that, having no coastline of its own, there is no alternative. Much smaller quantities are also imported from Kazakhstan, Croatia, Iraq and Azerbaijan.
Another problem is that Russian Ural crude has a higher sulfur content than Brent crude supplied from other countries. Hungary’s main refinery at Szazhalombatta, run by Hungarian oil giant MOL, and the Slovnaft refinery in Slovakia, also run by MOL, are both configured to process mainly Ural crude, not Brent. Within the EU, Orban is now the longest-serving leader. Far from leaving the bloc, he wants to remake it in his own image, as a union of sovereign nations. For this, he has even received praise from Putin. But Hungary’s argument that it cannot change is undermined by the Czech example. This is a country with a population similar to Hungary’s, and also landlocked. The Czech Republic has traditionally relied heavily on Russian crude for the eight million tons of oil it needs a year.
Starting in early 2022, following the full Russian occupation of Ukraine, the Czech government under Prime Minister Petr Fialla invested heavily in upgrading the existing Transalpine pipeline leading to the Italian port of Trieste.
At the same time, its refineries in Kralupy and Litvínov were adapted to Brent crude. In April 2025, Czech authorities proudly announced that they were no longer taking a single drop of Russian oil. Energy experts say that while MOL, the Hungarian oil giant, is quietly changing its technology, what is missing is a political decision by the government to move to the Adria pipeline from the Croatian port of Omisalj. There are also disagreements between the Croatian company Janaf and MOL – over how much oil the pipeline can handle. When the two meet next week, Trump will ask Orbán to show the political will to break away from Russian supplies.
But Orban may find this a difficult decision to explain to Hungarian voters. Having argued for years that Hungary could not survive without Russian oil and gas, he would lose his reputation if it turned out that he could.
Matt Whitaker, the US ambassador to NATO, said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday that Hungary had yet to take any active steps to end its dependence on Russian oil. “There’s a lot of planning that our friends in Hungary are going to have to do,” he said, and pledged US help to Hungary and Croatia to make that happen. As the seagull flies, Omisalj is just 70km from Trieste. Oil transported by sea from Kazakhstan, Libya, Azerbaijan, the US and Iraq could soon flow through the Adria pipeline to Hungary. Despite Orban’s dire warnings of rising prices, there is no evidence – at least so far – that Czech consumers will have to pay more. There is nothing his old friend Donald Trump likes more than getting a deal done. Orban will find out how persuasive the US president can be. (BBC)
