BELGRADE, January 17. /TASS/. Russia is ready to invest around $1.4 bln in infrastructure development in Serbia to continue the TurkStream project through this country, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday answering a question from TASS at a joint press conference with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic.
He noted that Russia is ready and has the necessary resources for the implementation of projects for the continuation of the pipeline to Europe, and "many countries show interest in it," but everything needs to be properly formalized. "Together with Serbia, we are working on it, it concerns development of infrastructure, including transit infrastructure on the Serbian territory. We are ready to invest the necessary resources, it will amount to around $1.4 bln," the Russian leader said, answering a question about the possibility of extending the TurkStream gas pipeline to Serbia.
"We are actually preparing this work, we practically started it, but in the end everything will depend on other countries, including the European Union - to what extent they will be able to protect their sovereign national interests in a dialogue with European structures," Putin noted.
Putin recalled that terminating the work on the South Stream project through Bulgaria was not Russia’s fault, but now Sofia is once again showing interest in continuing the TurkStream through its territory and "going further to Serbia, Hungary and so on". "We are fully