Gazprom buys Serbia national oil operator

The Russian – Serbian oil and natural gas collaboration agreement was signed on Friday in Kremlin after the meeting between the Russian president and the Serbian leaders, RIA Novosti informs. The agreement, signed for the following 30 years, includes the building of a natural gas transportation system on Serbian territory, so that the line with provide the fuel towards the Balkans and other European states.

Serbia will host 400 kilometers of the South Stream pipeline, which will have a transport capacity of over 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year. The construction of an underground natural gas deposit in Banatski Dvor will also be analyzed.

The building of South Stream through Serbia will transform the country in an important transit junction in the Russian gas delivery system providing European states.

Serbia and Russia also signed an agreement for the sale of the national oil operator, NIS (Natfna Industrija Srbije), to Gazprom Neft. Gazprom will buy 51% of the of stock for some 400 million euro and commits to investments worth at least 500 million euro.

The European Commission fears that Gazprom paid a price much lower than the real one, in exchange for Russia’s support to Belgrade in the Kosovo independence problem.