The Honorary President of the Employers' Union in Serbia, Nebojsa Atanasković, announced that part of the fuel will arrive in Serbia from the south, from North Macedonia, and the other, most likely the majority, will arrive from the north, mainly from Hungary, the national Serbian television RTS reports, quoted by BTA.
"Now we have a relatively short time to get used to the fact that supplies will go through other channels", Atanasković said regarding the oil crisis in Serbia.
According to him, Hungary "has the best opportunities because it has a large refinery - so it has the ability to deliver fuel by barges".
At the end of November, the Hungarian oil and gas company MOL announced that it would increase crude oil and fuel supplies to Serbia after crude oil supplies from Croatia were halted.
At the time, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó indicated that MOL had doubled supplies to Serbia in November and would deliver two and a half times more crude oil and fuel than usual in December.
In April, Szijjártó said that plans were underway to build an oil pipeline connecting Hungary and Serbia, which could start meeting all of Serbia's crude oil needs by 2028.
The pipeline is expected to have the capacity to transport 4 to 5 million tons of Russian oil to Serbia via Hungary each year, the foreign minister said at the time.
In late November, the Prime Minister of the Republic of North Macedonia, Hristijan Mickoski, announced that by the end of the year, the Thessaloniki – Skopje, which has been out of operation for more than 10 years, will resume its operations.
According to Mickoski, tests will be carried out, including for the pressure on the pipeline, and the price list for using the system has already been voted on by the government.
The Thessaloniki - Skopje oil pipeline, with a length of 213 km, was built in 2002 to connect the refineries of the Greek oil company “Hellenic Energy“ in Thessaloniki with the refinery with the oil processing facilities of the OKTA company in Skopje, which was also acquired by the Greek company, recalls the specialized Greek portal Worldenergynews.gr.
The pipeline, which is also owned by “Hellenic Energy“, stopped operating after the company considered that its activities were not profitable. There were also legal disputes between the company and North Macedonia, which further complicated the situation surrounding the possible reopening of the pipeline.
In November, the CEO of “Hellenic Energy“ Andreas Siamisis, quoted by the website energypress.gr, said at a forum in Athens that the company had already received the necessary permission from the government of North Macedonia and had the ambition to start exporting oil products through it by the end of the year. He noted that this is happening at a time when Greece is trying to use the gap that is opening in the Balkans after the withdrawal of Russian companies.
Since October 9, Serbia's national oil company NIS has been under US sanctions due to the majority stake of Russian companies in it. On January 10, NIS was placed under US sanctions over the war in Ukraine, which came into effect on October 9 after being postponed eight times.
In early January, the US announced that due to the war in Ukraine and the “secondary risk“ it would impose sanctions on Serbia's only oil company, NIS, which is majority-owned by the Russian oil giant “Gazprom“. Washington demanded the complete withdrawal of Russian capital from the company, but only at the end of November did the Russian side announce that it was ready to sell its stake.
The Serbian state owns 29.9 percent of NIS's shares, while “Gazprom Neft“ remains the main owner with 44.9 percent. At the end of September, the St. Petersburg-based company “Intelligence“ (Intelligence), affiliated with „Gazprom“, acquired an 11.3 percent stake in the parent company „Gazprom“.