NIS, Serbia, December 10. The Serbia-Bulgaria gas interconnector was a long-planned project, Serbian Minister of Mines and Energy Dubravka Djedović Handanović said, Trend reports.
She spoke at the launching ceremony of the Bulgaria-Serbia gas interconnector in Nis, Serbia.
"It is nice that we are here today because it is a great day, first of all, for the relations of our countries. This project was planned long ago. We managed to finalize the work within a year and agree with our friends from Azerbaijan on gas supplies, as well as to coordinate with our friends from Bulgaria," she said.
The minister said that the Serbia-Bulgaria interconnector is a major project, which is important both for positioning Serbia for gas supplies to Central and Eastern Europe, as well as for further gasification of the southern part of Serbia.
"First of all, thank you very much to all colleagues from Azerbaijan, to President Ilham Aliyev, to all those with whom we worked a lot last year. Of course, I thank all the contractors, subcontractors, workers who with their strength, faith, courage achieved these results in such a short time, building the entire 109 kilometers, laying pipes, welded pipes, insulated pipes, and then the gas metering station at different points, along the 109 kilometers through Serbia. Here, in this place, there was nothing on August 10. We managed, despite everything, to complete this project in order to have new sources of gas in this heating season," the minister added.
Dubravka Djedović Handanović also thanked the European Union for the financial support of 49 million euros.
"Of course, with the help of the funds of the Republic of Serbia, thanks to our stable budget and finances, we were able to take additional loans, as well as allocate our own funds to finance this important project," she said.