Nabucco gets consortium countries support

The Nabucco natural gas pipeline could be extended to supply countries across most of eastern and southeastern Europe, the governments of the consortium countries agreed on Tuesday. The governments of Austria, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey adopted a joint declaration that stressed the potential of Nabucco to supply the energy markets of the Western Balkans (Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Macedonia and Albania) and the Visegrád group countries (Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary). The governments, in a statement issued after a Nabucco Committee meeting in Bucharest, said they were committed to developing the necessary gas interconnections “to ensure that Nabucco can also supply the countries in the southern and central-north dimension of Europe.” The main Nabucco pipeline - or Nabucco West as it is now called after being shortened to start at the Turkey-Bulgaria border - would bring gas from Azerbaijan and other sources in the Middle East and Central Asia through Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary to Austria. Its company members are: Turkey’s Botas, Bulgaria Energy Holding, Romania’s Transgaz, Hungary’s FGSz and Austria’s OMV.

FGSz