“Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on August 30, 2024, asked his Hungarian counterpart Péter Szijjártó to lobby for the removal of oligarch Alisher Usmanov’s sister, Gulbahor Ismailova, from the EU sanctions list. This follows from an audio recording of an alleged conversation between Lavrov and Szijjártó, the transcript of which was published by The Insider, Frontstory, VSquare, Delfi Estonia and ICJK”, - reported on March 31 by the Telegram channel “Nastoyashchee Vremya”.
It is noted that Lavrov called Szijjártó about an hour after the Hungarian Foreign Minister landed in Budapest following a visit to russia. After exchanging a few phrases, Lavrov said: “Listen, I’m calling at Alisher’s request, and he just asked me to remind you that you were dealing with something regarding his sister”.
“Ms. Ismailova? — Szijjártó replies. — Yes, absolutely. The fact is that together with the Slovaks we are submitting to the EU a proposal to remove her from the list. We will submit it next week, and since a new period is beginning, the issue will be included on the agenda. We will do everything possible to remove her from the list”.
Lavrov thanked Szijjártó, after which, writes VSquare, they discussed their “shared contempt” for the European Union, especially for countries with a pro-Ukrainian position.
The report recalls that a week ago, The Washington Post reported that the government of Viktor Orbán had for many years “provided moscow with the opportunity to monitor sensitive discussions in the EU”. According to one of the publication’s sources, Szijjártó regularly called Lavrov during breaks in EU authority meetings to provide him with “operational reports on what was discussed”, as well as on possible decisions by European politicians.
As reported, in the EU suspected Hungary of transferring data to moscow — they want to limit Budapest’s access to classified information.