Energy experts: Sanctions against NIS are illogical, probably not even to come into effect

The sanctions of the United States of America (USA) against the Oil Industry of Serbia (NIS) will probably not even be introduced because economically they are not even logical, Serbia would be punished, not Russia, which was their goal, energy experts said.

– Gazprom, which is a co-owner of NIS, and its daughter company Gazprom Neft, are not the largest energy company in Russia. Gazprom is only third in terms of oil production, Lukoil is also bigger. Bearing all that in mind, the decision on sanctions has nothing to do with logic, and ever since their announcement, I have believed that it will not be implemented – said Milos Zdravkovic for Beta.

NIS has made a formal request to the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to delay the sanctions for a minimum of 90 days.

The request has been supported by the governments of Serbia and Hungary, and refers to obtaining general or special licenses that would enable NIS to maintain operations while an acceptable solution to the ownership structure and management is sought, with the aim of the company, which is regionally and strategically important for energy stability, continuing to operate. Zdravkovic stated that the energy companies Rosneft and Surgutneftgas were bigger than Gazprom, and that, in addition, Serbia received 82% of its oil through the Croatian oil pipeline Janaf, with which it has an oil transport contract until 2026.

According to him, Russia exports two million barrels of oil a day to China and 2.1 million barrels to India. He added that he did not know what “the workings of the previous American administration (of Joseph Biden) and the authorities of Serbia were.” According to him, any option in the political sense is possible, but a hostile takeover of NIS’s assets from Gazprom and an atomic power such as Russia is out of the question.

– Political events are accelerating, a new division of the world is announced, the end of the war in Ukraine on Russian terms. The only chance is for the sanctions to be postponed or abolished, because from my point of view, as an engineer, they are illogical, but politically possible. It is true that the problem must be solved, and postponement or cancellation is the only possible way, whether it will succeed, I don’t know, I hope – said Zdravkovic, who is an electrical engineer by profession.

He added that NIS was a strategic company for Serbia and that he believed that it would remain in Serbian hands “because it is the logic of business, energy, economy, security and the interests of the citizens of Serbia.”

– The chances are higher because a request has been made with the Hungarian government because Orban (Viktor) achieved good relations in the election campaign with the Republican Party of Donald Trump – said Zdravkovic.

The President of the Assembly of the Gas Association, Vojislav Vuletic, stated that he believed that the request of Serbia and Hungary to postpone the sanctions would bear fruit because, although the sanctions had been introduced to punish Russia, in fact it had also been a punishment for Serbia.

– Since we have been improving relations with America lately, I don't think it is in their interest to spoil them – said Vuletic.

He specified that America is a great power and that it is not easy to ask for the sanctions to be lifted immediately, but to start with postponing them, and then perhaps postponing them once more, “and then the Americans would probably give up on them.”

– That is my opinion, I have no confirmation that it will be like that. These sanctions would not mean anything to the Russians, maybe the NIS does one per mille of work for them, but it is significant for us, so I don’t think that the Americans’ goal is to worsen relations with Serbia – Vuletic said.

NIS a.d. Novi Sad

Udruženje za gas Beograd

Lukoil Srbija a.d. Beograd

Naftna industrija Srbije ad Novi Sad

NIS

Gazprom

Gazprom Neft

Rosneft

Surgutneftgas

Lukoil

OFAC

Janaf

Gas Association

Vojislav Vuletić

Miloš Zdravković

Josef Biden

Viktor Orban

Donald Trump

introduction of sanctions against NIS