Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is lying — and will continue to lie — about the alleged damage to the Druzhba oil pipeline, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum.

Axar.az informs that Lavrov referred to the European Commission’s plan to provide a €90 million loan to Kyiv, noting that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban had initially refused to support the decision.

“Orban said he would join the decision as soon as Zelensky opened the Druzhba oil pipeline. But Zelensky has still not opened it, and he will, I have no doubt, continue to claim that the pipeline is damaged,” Lavrov said.

The Russian foreign minister added that the issue has been ongoing for two months. According to him, Orbán and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico had to make considerable efforts to “practically force” the European Commission to politely ask Zelensky to allow experts to visit and verify whether the Druzhba pipeline was actually damaged.