Bulgaria suspends South Stream construction

Bulgaria has halted work on the South Stream project, Bulgarian Prime Minister Plamen Oresarski announced Sunday (8 June 2014) after meeting with a group of U.S. senators.

- We've received a request from the European Commission (EC), after which I ordered the suspension of work. Further activities will be defined upon additional consultations with Brussels - Itar-Tass cited Oresarski as saying.

The EU requested from Bulgaria on Wednesday to discontinue the implementation of South Stream project. On that occasion, EC Commissioner for Energy Sabina Berger cited two legal reasons for such step. One of these reasons is the European Commission's request for the allignment of bilateral agreements on the construction of South Stream gas pipeline with the norms referred to in the Third Energy Package.

Besides, Brussels has accused Bulgaria of violating European rules when announcing a tender for the construction of infrastructure projects and granting privileges to Russian and Bulgarian companies.

Russia has not yet received any official notice from Bulgaria about the suspension of work on South Stream, the Russian Energy Ministry announced Sunday.

However, this issue may be raised at a trilateral meeting on natural gas that should be held Monday in Brussels between the representatives of Russia, Ukraine and the EU, the spokesperson of aforementioned Russian ministry stressed.