Vucic said:
- Bulgaria has announced that it will stop importing Russian gas
- I am not sure that this is so easy to do
- We are simply saying we want Russian gas from the Balkan Stream
- You deliver it (gas) to our gas pipeline, for which we pay, and what you want to do next is your concern, this is not our problem for us
Vucic, who is also the leader of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party, is running for a 2nd presidential term in the upcoming elections on April 4th.
His comment is on the occasion of what was said by the Bulgarian Minister of Finance Asen Vassilev:
- In the current situation, there will be no negotiations with Gazprom
- There are alternatives like the old pipes of the Trans-Balkan flow
- We have a capacity of about 20 billion m3 and can be used in both directions, we need 3 billion m3
- There are supplies from Qatar, Algeria
- This is a pan-European strategy, in the next 1-2 weeks it will be discussed at the European level to make a common gas contract for the whole EU
- We expect this mechanism to work in the summer
He added to the pro-government Pink TV:
- Bulgaria cannot stop buying Russian gas because it will run out of gas
- Personally, I think this is a political statement due to the pressure on Bulgaria, but it is also pressure against Serbia and Hungary
