Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic announced that Serbia has reached an agreement to extend natural gas supplies from Russia until March 31, 2026, Serbian media reported, quoted by BTA.
“We have an agreement to extend gas supplies by another three months, until March 31, so that people can not worry and sleep peacefully“, Vucic said.
He said that he had information that representatives of “Gazprom“ are discussing the sale of a stake in Serbia's national oil company NIS and with the Hungarian oil company MOL, among other candidates.
“The Hungarians are our friends. Let's just finish as soon as possible by March 15 January", Vucic said, adding that today marks 75 days since not a single drop of crude oil has arrived in Serbia.
The date of January 15 is the deadline that Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic is giving the Russian side to sell its stake in NIS.
The Serbian state owns 29.9 percent of NIS's shares, while the main owner remains “Gazprom Neft“ with 44.9 percent. At the end of September, the St. Petersburg-based company “Intelligence“, affiliated with “Gazprom“, acquired 11.3 percent of the parent company “Gazprom“.
On January 10, NIS was placed under sanctions by the United States over the war in Ukraine, which came into effect on October 9 after being postponed eight times. Washington demanded a complete exit 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 share. As a result of the sanctions, Serbia is threatened by a crisis in oil products, but the Serbian authorities assure that the country has fuel reserves and has tripled its imports.