EU to Probe Serbia's South Stream Deal

The Energy Community Secretariat of the EU has asked the EU Council to examine the legality of bilateral agreements on the construction of the South Stream gas pipeline concluded between Serbia and Russia's Gazprom company.

The Secretariat said Serbia had failed to respond to repeated requests from Brussels to inspect the operations of Srbijagas and Yugorosgas, Serbia's two transmission system operators in the South Stream section through Serbia.

According to the EU Energy Community, the agreements between Serbia and Gazprom do not comply with EU rules designed to prevent one company from being both a producer and a supplier of natural gas.

After Belgrade apparently ignored its objections, the Secretariat requested an opinion from the EU Council.

The EU Energy Commissioner, Gunther Oettinger, warned on several occasions that Gazprom's bilateral agreements with several countries, including Serbia, do not comply with EU regulations and need to be renegotiated.

This topic was planned to be on the agenda of the EU-Russia summit in Moscow, but all energy negotiations have now been postponed due to the crisis in Ukraine.

Brussels has not yet replied to a proposal put forward on Wednesday by the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, to hold negotiations on Russia's gas supply to the EU on April 27 in Moscow.

Work on the Serbian section of the pipeline started in November. When complete, the pipeline will pump gas from Russia under the Black Sea, then through Bulgaria and Serbia towards Hungary, Slovenia and Italy.

The job of building the pipeline section in Serbia, which has a projected capacity to carry 40.5 billion cubic metres of natural gas a year, will take two years.