MOSCOW, September 18. /TASS/. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to consider expansion of financial cooperation between the two countries.
"I consider financial cooperation to be very important as well," he told a press conference following the meeting of presidents in Moscow on Tuesday. "I asked Mr. President (of Russian Federation Vladimir Putin) to (think of the ways to - TASS) expand our financial cooperation," PM added.
Despite the decline in the Russian-Hungarian trade turnover due to the EU sanctions against Moscow, the countries have managed to reverse the negative trend, he said.
"Despite the fact that our bilateral trade turnover has dropped due to sanctions imposed by the European Union we have managed to reverse the trend," he said.
The two countries have huge cooperation potential in such areas as agriculture, energy, culture and other fields, Orban said, adding that Russia and Hungary are important partners.
In 2017, mutual trade between Moscow and Budapest soared by 24.7% to $5.4 bln. Russia’s exports rose by 24% to $3.3 bln, while imports increased by 25.9% to $2.1 bln.
Gas supplies
The gas supplies agreement between Russia and Hungary will be extended after 2020, Orban said.
"We managed to reach an agreement on gas supplies for 2020. As Mr. President put it, no secret that Hungary wants the pipeline to run through Hungary. I asked Mr. President to think about this possibility," he noted.
Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Szijjarto said earlier that the country is keen to reach an agreement with Gazprom on the terms of the agreement for a further period as soon as possible.
In 2017, Moscow and Budapest extended the gas delivery contract until early 2021 and started the discussion of its further prolongation. The long-term contracts on Russian gas supplies to Hungary were in effect in 1996-2015, and later were prolonged until the end of 2019.
Paks 2 NPP project
Russia and Hungary will follow through on the joint project on Paks 2 nuclear power plant, Orban said.
"I consider it (project - TASS) to be a flagship of cooperation, and we have to follow through on it," he said.
Russia and Hungary agreed to build two reactors at Paks in January 2014. Russia will extend a 10 bln euro loan to Hungary to implement the project. Total investments in construction of two new Paks power units will not exceed 12.5 bln euro. The agreement provides for borrowed funds to be used within the period from 2014 through 2025.
In February 2018, the Austrian government filed a statement of claim to the European Court of common jurisdiction against the decision made by the European Commission (EC) to approve allocation of subsidies to Hungary for construction of new power units of the Paks 2 nuclear power plant. Budapest replied that the construction of two new units would begin as scheduled.