Vladislav Veselica, a member of the Management Board of state-owned oil transportation company JANAF, confirmed that the company has a take-or-pay contract with MOL for oil transport through the end of the year. Under this agreement, JANAF will charge MOL for contracted services regardless of whether the Hungarian company utilizes the system. The contract obligates JANAF to deliver a specified quantity of oil, with MOL required to pay for the service even if they do not take delivery.
While the exact charges for the contracted quantities were not disclosed, Veselica noted that JANAF is set to transport 2.2 million tons of crude oil from its Omisalj terminal to the Hungarian border and an additional 400,000 tons from the Sisak terminal this year. Moreover, JANAF has storage agreements with MOL for 79,000 cubic meters of gas at the Omisalj terminal and 70,000 cubic meters at Sisak.
This announcement follows MOL’s recent agreement to continue receiving crude oil from Russia via the Druzhba pipeline, with deliveries occurring at the Belarus-Ukraine border. This arrangement comes in response to tightened sanctions on Russian Lukoil, which is now barred from exporting oil through Ukraine.
Concerns are rising regarding the potential lack of oil supply for MOL’s refineries in Hungary and Slovakia via JANAF, especially as discussions and capacity tests around the pipeline have taken place. Additionally, there have been strong complaints from Hungary regarding transport costs, with Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto labeling Croatia as an unreliable transit country. This situation may escalate into a new dispute between Hungary and Croatia over JANAF operations.
