The Bulgarian government has issued new bonds boosting the capital of the
project company managing the Burgas-Alexandroupoli oil pipeline,
a ditched project between Bulgaria, Greece, and Russia.
Burgas-Alexandroupoli was renounced under a 2010 proposal by Bulgarian
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov's first cabinet in 2010, with Parliament
approving the freeze at the end of 2011..
Now the cabinet says the state-owned venture needs to fulfill its
"financial commitments in 2016 as a shareholder in the international
company Trans Balkan Pipeline BV, registered in Amsterdam, the Netherlands,
which was created on the based of an intergovernmental cooperation committee in
construction and exploitation of the Burgas-Alexandroupoli pipeline
between the Russian Federation, Bulgaria and Greece".
The Trans-Balkan Pipeline B.V. (ТВР) project company was
established to manage the implementation of the scheme, with Russia’s
Transneft, Rosneft and Gazpromneft controlling a 51% stake and Bulgariaand Greece holding stakes of 24.5% in it.
The cost of the oil pipeline, whose construction was announced after a
2007 agreement, was estimated at EUR 1 B.
Wednesday's announcement of BGN 88 000 injected into the project company is far from being the first allocation of state money to a capital hike at Project Company OilPipeline Burgas - Alexandroupolis BG.
As of April 13, Wednesday, an inquiry into the Commerce Register shows the step
has been taken six times since the official demise of the project in the autumn
of 2011, the last one having been in December of last year. Back then, the
company's capital amounted to BGN 24.1829 M.
Attempts have been made at bringing the project back to the table, with Russian
and Greek energy ministers discussing the possibility in June of last year, amid interest from companies such as Chevron.
Russia's Energy Minister Alexander Novak, however, later said it was Bulgaria's decision that made it impossible to restart the
project.
(www.novinite.com)
