Putin proposing to Serbia to start talks about new gas agreement

The president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, has proposed to Serbia for talks about a new agreement on the delivery of Russian gas to begin soon, considering that the current one expires in March 2025. Let us remind that Serbia signed the previous agreement with Russia in the midst of the energy crisis in 2022 for three years. According to that agreement, Russia delivers to Serbia 2.2 billion cubic meters of gas a year at a preferred price which ranges between USD 300 and 420 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas.

With this agreement, Serbia managed to protect the citizens and the economy from the high prices in the market during 2022 and 2023, which reached record values following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine. Thanks to this agreement, the price of gas for the citizens and the economy has been among the lowest in Europe.

Now it is time for a new agreement, Putin told the deputy prime minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vulin, with whom he met this Wednesday in Vladivostok. Putin also said that he expected the president of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, at this autumn’s summit of BRICS.

At the meeting, held on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum, Putin also told Vulin that there had been a slight drop in the trade between Russia and Serbia and pointed to the need to look into the causes of that change.

Putin said that “it is probably time to have a meeting” of the Intergovernmental Committee for Trade-Economic and Science-Technical Cooperation of Serbia and Russia.

Russia drops from list of Serbia’s biggest trade partners in April

In April, Russia dropped from the list of the biggest foreign trade partners of Serbia, and the data for May, June and July show that it hasn’t managed to return that position. For years back, Russia was in the top five when it comes to the import of goods, primarily due to the import of gas and oil. The import of Russian oil to Serbia was banned on December 5, 2022, due to the European sanctions.

In 2022, Serbia and Russia achieved a record trade cooperation worth as much as USD 4.2 billion. The jump occurred because we increased the imports and imported goods worth over USD 3 billion, mostly gas and oil.

The ban on the import of oil was the biggest factor causing the drop of the trade between Serbia and Russia in 2023.

BRICS

Vladimir Putin

Aleksandar Vulin

Aleksandar Vučić

supplying Serbia with Russian gas