Slovakia and Hungary won’t cut off power imports to Ukraine, Ukrenergo confirms
Photo: Vitalii Zaichenko (Oleh Momot, RBC-Ukraine)
In an interview with RBC-Ukraine, Vitalii Zaychenko, Chairman of the Board of NPC Ukrenergo, denied the possibility of unilaterally terminating electricity imports from Slovakia or Hungary.
According to him, despite the political statements of some Prime Ministers, there are no real risks for commercial exchange.
"No one is blocking anything. Everything is working very well with the Slovaks. Until the end of October, the line between Ukraine and Slovakia was under repair, so there was no commercial exchange of electricity between us. Now it is," Zaichenko says.
He adds that the countries are working on a significant increase in the total capacity of interconnectors at the border.
"Slovakia is one of the best markets in Europe for purchasing electricity. They, like us, have a lot of nuclear power generation,” explains the head of Ukrenergo.
Zaichenko stressed that Slovakia and Hungary are members of ENTSO-E and cannot make unilateral decisions to stop imports.
"The cessation of imports is a violation of the rules of free commercial exchange of electricity. Such actions by the governments of the two countries would violate several directives of the EU's Third Energy Package," he stresses.
The head of the NPC also notes that cooperation with Ukraine is beneficial for both countries, as due to Russian attacks, the price of electricity in Ukraine is currently higher than in neighboring EU countries.
Situation with electricity in Ukraine
Ukraine has proposed to Slovakia to create a joint energy hub for the supply of oil and gas.
Earlier, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Kyiv was preparing alternative proposals for Slovakia in the field of energy cooperation that could replace dependence on Russian energy carriers.
And recently, Zelenskyy announced new agreements between Ukraine and Slovakia.
