Romania shows interest in South Stream

Romanian Economics Minister Varujan Vosganian has announced that Romania is currently examining the possibilty of participating in the Russian-Italian gas pipeline project South Stream. South Stream is regarded as a rival to the European pipeline project Nabucco. The newspaper Adevarul speculates about the reasons for Vosganian's announcement. "Our neighbours, the Bulgarians and the Serbs have concluded the deal with Moscow, but things have been delayed. Apparently there are Russian demands that Sofia and Belgrade regard as excessive. ... Vladimir Socor, one of the most important observers of geopolitics in the ex-Soviet territories, has pointed out that Moscow is threatening to change the route of South Stream so that it runs through Romania. Bulgaria and Serbia might be prepared to swallow Moscow's conditions if they were convinced that they would otherwise lose the project to Romania. It is difficult to say whether Romania is intending to join the South Stream project or whether it simply wants to force its Serbian and Bulgarian neighbours in a particular direction in its own interests, but at the same time it is helping to 'bury ' the Nabucco variant."

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