Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced on Tuesday that the Soviet-era Druzhba pipeline, which carries Russian oil westward through Ukraine into central Europe, is ready to resume operations following repairs — a development that appears to have cleared the main obstacle to releasing a long-delayed €90 billion ($106m) EU loan to Kyiv.
The pipeline, which runs through a pumping station near the town of Brody in western Ukraine, was damaged in late January during Russian strikes on Ukrainian territory. Hungary and Slovakia, the two EU member states most dependent on the overland Russian oil supply, accused Kyiv of deliberately stalling repairs, an allegation Zelenskyy firmly denied. "The pipeline can resume operation," Zelenskyy wrote on X. "Ukraine has fulfilled what the European Union asked of us." EU Council President António Costa thanked Zelenskyy for completing the work, and EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said she expected "a positive decision" on the loan within 24 hours, with EU ambassadors set to formally green-light the disbursement when they meet in Brussels on Wednesday.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán had blocked the loan — originally approved by European leaders at a December summit — by tying it to the pipeline dispute. He pledged over the weekend to lift his veto once oil began flowing again. The political calculus in Budapest has also shifted following recent Hungarian elections, in which opposition leader Péter Magyar defeated Orbán, with the incoming government signalling it would not stand in the way of the loan. A 20th package of EU sanctions against Russia, also previously blocked by Hungary, is likewise expected to move forward.
The episode has exposed a broader tension within the EU: while the bloc banned seaborne Russian oil imports after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, it kept land-based pipeline flows legal, allowing Hungary and Slovakia to continue receiving Russian crude. Critics have pointed to the awkwardness of pressuring Ukraine — the country under attack — to restore infrastructure that benefits Moscow's energy revenues. Ukraine, for its part, urgently needs the EU funds to cover budget shortfalls, though a recent IMF loan provided temporary breathing room while the standoff continued.
Adding a further layer of complexity, Ukrainian drones struck an oil pumping and dispatch facility in Russia's Samara region overnight — a site that forms part of the Druzhba pipeline's supply chain. The Kremlin said on Tuesday that Russia was technically prepared to resume oil flows to Hungary and Slovakia once what it described as Ukraine's "blackmail" ended. Reuters reported, citing an anonymous energy industry source, that oil is expected to flow through the pipeline as early as Wednesday.