Aleksandar Vucic (BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on May 29 that he had arranged a favorable deal on procuring Russian natural gas during a telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and that the details of the arrangement would be specified in the coming days.
"We had a very good talk on several subjects, the most important of which were our bilateral relations and the gas deal," Vucic told reporters. He stressed that Serbia would continue to receive Russian gas according to the current favorable formula, calculated based on oil prices on the global market, and that this meant that Serbia would have by far the best price of gas in Europe.
"We will be signing a three-year contract and tomorrow or the day after tomorrow we will discuss the amount of gas. Serbia needs large quantities of gas, but, if I may say so, we will have a secure winter, while how much the gas will cost depends on further talks," Vucic said.
He clarified that the price of natural gas Serbia would procure from the Russian Gazprom company was now one-third of the price that other European countries were paying, while in the winter it could drop to one-tenth or one-twelfth of that. He said he expected the price to be between USD340 to EUR350 for 1,000 cubic meters.
He also said that the arranged price applied to 2.2 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year, and that Serbia needed another 800 million cubic meters. Serbia is negotiating a new natural gas deal with Gazprom because the six-month agreement signed in November 2021 expires on May 31. The current price of Russian natural gas for Serbia is USD270 for 1,000 cubic meters.
Gazprom is the majority owner of the Petroleum Industry of Serbia -- either directly or through subsidiary companies, the only natural gas supplier in Serbia and the majority owner of both pipelines that deliver Russian gas to Serbia.
The Kremlin confirmed that Putin and Vucic had agreed on Russia continuing to supply Serbia with natural gas. Putin and Vucic exchanged opinions on a number of topics -- the situation in Ukraine, events related to Kosovo, and "re-affirmed the mutual disposition" to consistently strengthen the strategic partnership between Russia and Serbia based on the traditionally close ties between the two nations, the Kremlin said in a press release.
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