Russia proposes Slovakia join TurkStream

MOSCOW – Reuters

Russia and Slovakia are in talks about Bratislava joining the TurkStream and Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline projects, Russian news agencies quoted Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev as saying on June 5.

“We need to find common points and mutually beneficial cooperation areas concerning connecting Slovakia to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, as well as to Turkish Stream,” TASS quoted Medvedev as saying after talks with Slovakian Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini in Moscow.

The TurkStream is a project which will carry Russian gas via a pipeline under the Black Sea bypassing Ukraine and onward through Bulgaria, Serbia, and Hungary.

The TurkStream consists of two lines across the Black Sea, the first of which will serve Turkey with a capacity of 15.75 billion cubic meters, while the second line is planned to serve Europe. Each pipeline is 930 kilometers in length, laid at depths reaching 2,200 meters.

The project is the biggest-diameter offshore gas pipeline in the world laid at such depths. The deep sea pipe-laying was carried out by Pioneering Spirit, the world’s biggest construction vessel.

Nord Stream 2, a 11 billion euro ($12.4 billion) project to build a gas pipeline from Russia to Germany, has come under fire from the United States and several eastern European and Nordic countries, which fear it will undermine Ukraine’s gas transit revenues and increase the EU’s reliance on Russian gas.

Slovakia is ready to provide its storages for gas that will be delivered via the pipeline, Interfax and TASS cited Pellegrini as saying.