Ukraine has completed repair work on the damaged section of the Druzhba oil pipeline, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said today.
According to Zelenskyy, the pipeline can resume operations, although there are concerns about new Russian strikes.
“Thirdly, as agreed in communication with the European Union, Ukraine has completed repair work on the section of the Druzhba oil pipeline that was damaged by a Russian strike. The pipeline can resume functioning. Although no one can currently guarantee that Russian strikes on the pipeline infrastructure will not happen again, our specialists have ensured the basic conditions for restoring the operation of the pipeline system and equipment”, Zelenskyy said.
Ukraine is linking the resumption of pipeline operations with the unblocking of an EU support package.
“We link this to the unblocking of the European support package for Ukraine, which has already been approved by the European Council. And we hope that partners will also take the appropriate steps on the clusters for Ukraine — we have already completed our part of the work on the first clusters”, the Ukrainian president said.
Zelenskyy also called for continued systematic sanctions pressure on Russia and stressed the need to diversify energy supplies to Europe.
Supplies of Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia through Ukrainian territory via the Druzhba oil pipeline stopped at the end of January. Kyiv said the pipeline had been damaged by a Russian drone strike. Kyiv had promised to restore the damaged section by the end of April.
