“Under the contract, Serbia will get guarantees for gas deliveries through 2021 at a preferential price that is 13 percent lower than the current price,” Miller said at the signing ceremony in the Serbian capital.
The deal was signed between Gazprom, YugoRosGaz, which is a Gazprom subsidiary in Serbia, and Serbia’s state-run energy firm Srbijagas.
Gas deliveries to Serbia will total 1.5 billion cubic meters per year. The sides did not specify the gas price under the new deal, or answer questions from journalists. Petar Stanojevic, an aide to Serbia’s energy minister, said in early March that Belgrade planned to purchase Russian natural gas in 2013 at the price of $370 per 1,000 cubic meters.
The current price for Serbia, Russia’s long-standing ally in the Balkans, is far below the price of around $430 per 1,000 cubic meters paid by Ukraine, for example, for Russian natural gas deliveries. Russia has repeatedly hinted it could cut the gas price for Ukraine if the ex-Soviet state joins the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, an offer that Kiev is reluctant to accept following its course toward European integration.
In 2012, the energy ministers of Russia and Serbia signed a long-term framework agreement on the delivery of up to 5 billion cubic meters of Russian natural gas to the Balkan country per year.
Serbia annually consumes about 2.5 billion cubic meters of gas, including 0.5 billion cubic meters of locally produced gas.
