Bratislava – Slovakia will lose hundreds of millions of euros both by purchasing gas from another supplier and by lost transit fees to other countries based on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s decision. If the Ukrainian president wants to continue this approach towards Slovakia, it raises the question of whether the Slovak Republic will continue to support Ukraine’s entry into the EU. The Hlas-SD party stated this on Tuesday in a statement regarding the halt of gas supplies from Ukraine.
“If President Zelensky wants to be perceived as a partner, he must behave accordingly. Slovakia has already shown what true partnership means – we have provided significant military, political, and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine, and at the same time extended a helping hand to all people fleeing the senseless war conflict,” emphasized the second largest coalition party.
According to the Hlas-SD party, it is now time for the same level of respect and cooperation to be demonstrated from his side as well. The Hlas-SD party’s statement indicates that this political entity prefers to resolve open issues through negotiations – also with the active participation of the European Commission – and not through unilateral steps by Ukraine.
The Slovak government delegation’s meeting on stopping gas transit will take place on Thursday, January 9, in Brussels. The Prime Minister of the Slovak Republic, Robert Fico (Smer-SD), and the Minister of Economy, Denisa Saková (Hlas-SD), along with representatives of the European Commission, will discuss the halting of gas supplies to Slovakia. This was confirmed by the Office of the Government of the Slovak Republic (ÚV SR) on Tuesday.
On Tuesday, Michal Šimečka, the chairman of the opposition liberal party Progressive Slovakia (PS), pointed out that Robert Fico is directly responsible for the gas supply issue and emphasized that the Prime Minister had several months to discuss it.
“However, instead of good relations with Kyiv and the EU, he chose to ‘crawl’ to dictator Putin in Moscow. To that Putin, whose brutal attack on Ukraine is the source of the entire gas crisis. Fico has ruled here most of the time and had almost 14 years to secure Slovakia’s independence from Russia and diversify gas supplies. But he squandered that time,” the opposition leader underlined. (January 7)
