Hungary has entered a 10-year agreement with Shell Plc for gas supplies starting in 2026.

This was announced by Hungary's Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto in an interview with Bloomberg during the Gastech conference in Milan.

Szijjarto stated that Budapest signed a contract for the supply of 2 billion cubic meters of gas over the next ten years, utilizing Czech and German pipelines.

Despite the EU's goal to halt imports of Russian fossil fuels by 2027, Hungary has long opposed these plans, strengthening its energy ties with Russia since the beginning of the war in Ukraine. Budapest has urged the bloc to compensate member states for costs related to supply diversification.

“We are negotiating other contracts with different western suppliers, but we cannot announce them yet,” Szijjarto said.

The Foreign Minister claimed that the EU's current plan to phase out Russian energy imports poses a serious threat to Hungary's energy security, arguing that the country lacks sufficient pipeline infrastructure from other markets.

Hungary has a contract with Russia's Gazprom for the supply of 4.5 billion cubic meters of gas per year, valid until 2036, with additional purchases since 2022.

Szijjarto also mentioned that Hungary's nuclear ambitions, which include doubling nuclear capacity with two new reactors, will help cut current gas imports by half and significantly reduce fuel supply pressure, enabling the country to meet 70% of its electricity demand independently.

“This is a situation of a different scale. We hope to advance in a way that the two new reactors will be connected to the power grid in the first half of the next decade,” Szijjarto said.