Ambassador says Serbia and Russia may stick to short-term gas deals

Serbia and Russia are unlikely to agree on a new long-term gas supply contract due to European Union pressure, market instability and transit risks, Russia’s ambassador to Serbia told Sputnik on February 9, signalling that supplies will instead continue under short-term extensions.

Serbia failed to secure a new long-term contract with Russia’s Gazprom last year after Moscow declined to offer a multi-year deal in October 2025. A short-term agreement reached in December expires on March 31, leaving Belgrade dependent on temporary extensions for continued access to discounted Russian gas.

Russian ambassador Aleksandar Bocan-Kharchenko told Sputnik that while Moscow and Belgrade had agreed in principle on gas deliveries at acceptable prices, the duration of any contract remained a technical and commercial issue rather than a political one.

He said EU energy policy towards Russia had made the gas market more volatile and undermined long-term planning, pushing companies towards shorter, more flexible contracts.

Bocan-Kharchenko said Serbia was under pressure from the EU over its energy cooperation with Russia, but denied that Moscow was pressuring Belgrade to abandon its EU accession path in exchange for long-term gas supplies.

Another obstacle to a long-term deal was the lack of secure gas transit through Bulgaria, as the EU member state plans to end Russian gas transit by 2028.

Serbia’s existing long-term gas supply agreement with Russia expires at the end of March. Srbijagas director Dusan Bajatovic told state broadcaster RTS on February 10 that the deal would likely be extended for another six months.

Bajatovic said household gas prices would remain unchanged and that Serbia had sufficient supplies until the end of the heating season.

He said daily gas deliveries would fall to about 6mn cubic metres from March, compared with 10mn previously, due to high storage levels. Serbia currently pays around €270 per 1,000 cubic metres of Russian gas, below European spot prices, he added.

Gas storage at the Banatski Dvor facility stands at about 400mn cubic metres, Bajatovic said, ensuring supply security even without additional imports in coming months.

He said increasing gas supplies from Azerbaijan was not realistic in the short term, while joint gas purchases with the EU were still under discussion.

Bajatovic added that Serbia’s Balkan Stream pipeline was operating reliably and remained central to both domestic supply and gas transit, while new interconnectors with North Macedonia and Bulgaria were unlikely to be completed before 2027.

Separately, Bocan-Kharchenko said negotiations over the sale of Serbia’s Oil Industry of Serbia (NIS), majority-owned by Gazprom, were nearing completion, adding that Russia was seeking a reliable buyer for the sanctioned asset.