BUCHAREST (Romania), December 4 (SeeNews) – A Romanian company based in the Black Sea port of Constanta has signed a $250 million (166 million euro) contract with Russian gas giant Gazprom to build an underwater gas pipeline in Russia, Romania’s President Traian Basescu said late on Thursday.
"Two weeks ago the Constanta oilfield services trust signed a contract with Gazprom to build an underwater gas pipeline worth $250 million to Sochi [Russian Black sea port where the 2014 Olympic Games will be held]," Basescu told a debate with Mircea Geoana, his challenger in the run-off presidential elections to be held on December 6.
"A Romanian company will build this pipeline," he added.
Following Basescu's announcement, Constanta-based daily Ziua de Constanta reported on its online version that the Romanian company that won the tender to build the pipeline to Sochi is drilling contractor Grup Servicii Petroliere (GSP). Ziua de Constanta said sources closed to the head of GSP, Valentin Gabriel Comanescu, confirmed the report.
A Gazprom official declined to comment when contacted by SeeNews on Friday and GSP officials were not immediately available.
Gazprom said earlier it plans to build a 174-kilometre gas pipeline linking Russian cities Dzhubga and Sochi, in a bid to improve gas supply to Sochi ahead of the 2014 Olympic Games. Some 150 kilometres of the pipeline will lie under water.
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