Trump grants Hungary’s Orban, a Putin ally, exemption from Russian oil sanctions
The US president hit Russia’s two biggest oil companies with sanctions last month over Moscow’s refusal to end its war in Ukraine
US President Donald Trump handed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban a one-year exemption from sanctions for buying Russian oil and gas on Friday, after the close right-wing allies held a chummy White House meeting.
Trump slapped sanctions on Moscow’s two largest oil companies in October after losing patience with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his refusal to end the nearly four-year-old invasion of Ukraine.
But while Trump has pushed other European countries to stop buying oil that he says funds Moscow’s war machine, Orban used his first trip to the White House since Trump’s return to power to push for special treatment.
As they heaped praise on each other, Trump said he was considering an exemption because landlocked Hungary had to rely on pipelines that made it dependent on Russian oil and gas.
“As you know, they don’t have the advantage of having sea,” Trump told reporters.
US slaps sanctions on Russian oil firms
Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said after the meeting that Washington had granted a “full and unlimited exemption from sanctions on oil and gas”.