Hungary has accepted the EU's 2027 gas deadline, but its US sanctions waiver expires first

Hungary's government has put a date on leaving Russian gas, and it is roughly the date Brussels set. Euronews reported on 26 September that Economy and Energy Minister Istvan Kapitany said the country would be ready to decouple from Russian supplies within a year — which lands on the EU's own deadline, a ban on long-term Russian pipeline gas contracts from 30 September 2027. What Budapest has not secured is the cover to get there. The American waiver keeping Hungarian purchases of Russian oil and gas clear of US sanctions was granted for one year in November 2025, and a new US sanctions law signed on 18 September has added tariff authority on top of it.

Who governs, and with what mandate

Hungary voted on 12 April 2026. Peter Magyar's Respect and Freedom Party (Tisza) took 141 of the 199 seats in the National Assembly against 52 for Fidesz-KDNP, a two-thirds majority. Turnout was close to 80 per cent, a post-communist record, Al Jazeera reported, citing the National Election Office; the National Election Commission completed the results on 29 April. Magyar was sworn in on 9 May, ending Viktor Orban's sixteen years in office.

The mandate on energy was narrower. At his first post-election press conference on 13 April, Magyar said Hungary would keep buying the cheapest available supply, Russian included: "No one can change geography; Russia and Hungary are here to stay." Tisza's horizon for ending Russian fossil fuel dependence is 2035, a date Magyar had given RFE/RL in October 2025: "We don't want to get rid of (Russian energy sources) tomorrow, but by a target date of 2035."

On EU money the reset has largely worked, and that story is told elsewhere: finance ministers were set in July to clear Hungary's revised EUR 10bn recovery envelope, and on 9 September Budapest notified the Commission of rule-of-law remedies that could release a further EUR 4.2bn in cohesion funds.

How large the gas problem actually is

The 90 per cent figure that circulates belongs to oil, not gas. Russian crude was about 90 per cent of Hungarian oil supply in 2025, roughly 100,000 barrels a day, according to Euronews; a Center for the Study of Democracy report cited by Al Jazeera traces the rise from 61 per cent in 2021 to 93 per cent in 2025. Gas is lower. ACER, the EU's agency of energy regulators, estimated Hungary and Slovakia at roughly 70 to 80 per cent Russian gas in 2024, and the same CSD report put Hungary's share at about three-quarters of annual imports.

Gas is therefore the easier half. Hungary consumes roughly 8 billion cubic metres a year and remains the EU's largest buyer of Russian gas; the ten-year Shell-MVM contract signed in September 2025 supplies about 200 million cubic metres a year from January 2026, some 2.5 per cent of consumption, so a replacement must come from LNG and regional interconnection rather than any single deal. Analysts quoted by Euronews judge the pivot feasible on infrastructure grounds: "Such a pivot cannot happen overnight, but is perfectly realistic."

Oil is harder and has no date. MOL's refineries, configured for Urals crude, "should be capable of operating fully on non-Russian crude by the end of 2026" on the Kyiv Independent's account, though a Kpler analyst told Euronews it "would come at a significant financial cost". The EU's exemption for Hungarian and Slovak pipeline oil runs to September 2027; Budapest has set nothing against it but 2035.

The Washington clock

On 18 September the White House announced that H.R. 5334, the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026, had been signed into law; it cleared the Senate 86-11 in August and the House 262-159 on 16 September. The act authorises tariffs of up to 100 per cent on goods from countries that buy Russian oil and gas or help Moscow evade restrictions, and lets the president waive those powers where he certifies a national interest and explains it to Congress.

Hungary's protection is the earlier, narrower waiver. After his White House meeting on 7 November 2025, Orban claimed a "full sanctions exemption for the TurkStream and Druzhba pipelines", and Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto called it indefinite. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on 12 November that it ran for one year, describing Hungarian purchases as "a very small piece of what Russia sells. It's almost all of what they buy." On the American account that cover lapses around November 2026, well before any Hungarian exit date. No request by the Magyar government for relief under the new act appears in the sources reviewed.

What the date still depends on

Hungary's action to annul Regulation (EU) 2026/261, Case C-46/26, was brought on 2 February 2026 by the outgoing government. Budapest argues the regulation is in substance a restrictive measure rather than trade policy, and that forcing it to restructure its energy supply infringes Article 194(2) TFEU. Whether the new government presses or withdraws it is the clearest test of whether the 2027 date is policy or presentation.

Paks II is the second. Construction formally began in February 2026, but on 13 August Magyar said he did not really see that Rosatom had kept to the contract — the plant should have been operating in 2024 — and that implementation costs were roughly doubling. Rosatom's chief executive, Aleksey Likhachov, says the agreed schedule holds.

The third is Moscow. After Hungary's UN General Assembly position paper stated that "Russia's behaviour poses a threat to Hungary, Europe and the global order", State Duma defence committee member Andrei Kolesnik said on 27 August that oil and energy supplies were now in doubt. That was a legislator, not the Russian state, and no interruption has followed. Druzhba's one real stoppage this year was physical: damaged in a Russian strike in western Ukraine in late January, the line resumed flows in April after Kyiv completed repairs.

What to watch

• Whether Budapest withdraws or pursues Case C-46/26 against the phase-out regulation.
• Whether the November 2025 US waiver is renewed, replaced or allowed to lapse, and whether Hungary seeks relief under the 2026 act.
• Whether the government attaches a date to Russian oil, as distinct from gas, before the EU's September 2027 pipeline exemption expires.
• Whether the Paks II review becomes a decision, and on what terms.

On gas, the new government's timetable is broadly compatible with the EU's, which is more than could be said of its predecessor. On oil it is nine years adrift, and the constraint that bites first is American rather than European.

Sources

• Al Jazeera — Peter Magyar's Tisza wins Hungary election as Viktor Orban concedes
• Al Jazeera — Peter Magyar sworn in as Hungary's PM, ending Orban's 16 years in power
• National Election Office — 2026 parliamentary elections
• Al Jazeera — Can Hungary wean itself off Russian energy, as its new leader has promised?
• Euronews — Can Peter Magyar break Hungary's reliance on Russian oil?
• Euronews — Russian gas imports rise despite EU phase-out
• Euronews — Behind the scenes: How the C8 summit and an oil deal exposed fragile Hungary-Ukraine ties
• Euronews — Hungary takes one more step to normalise relations with Brussels over rule of law
• Euronews — EU set to greenlight Hungary's EUR 10 billion recovery envelope
• Euronews — Russian MP threatens Hungary with energy cut-off after Budapest labels Moscow a security threat
• Euronews — Zelenskyy announces Druzhba oil pipeline repaired and 'can resume operation'
• Kyiv Independent — Magyar's Russian energy phase-out plan for Hungary falls short
• Kyiv Independent — Rubio says Hungary received only 1-year sanctions waiver on Russian oil, gas
• Kyiv Independent — Hungary signs its biggest-ever Western gas deal with Shell, but refuses to quit Russian supply
• RFE/RL — Hungarian opposition leader Magyar tells RFE/RL no quick end to Russian energy imports
• RFE/RL — Trump signs Russia-Iran sanctions bill, putting new pressure tools at his disposal
• The White House — Congressional Bill H.R. 5334 signed into law
• Congress.gov — H.R.5334, Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026
• EUR-Lex — Case C-46/26: Action brought on 2 February 2026
• Telex — Rosatom on Paks II: we are sticking to the agreed plan. Peter Magyar: I have my doubts
• Telex — Construction of Hungary's second nuclear power plant officially underway