Despite EU sanctions, Serbian president secures gas deal with Putin
As the war in Ukraine rages, Serbia's president announced that he has secured an "extremely favourable" natural gas deal with Russia during a telephone conversation on Sunday with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić has refused to explicitly condemn Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and his country has not joined Western sanctions against Moscow -- one of a handful in Europe, including Belarus and neighbouring Bosnia.
The country's national air carrier Air Serbia is also among a few on the continent that still operates flights to Russia.
Vučić claims he wants to take Serbia into the European Union but has spent recent years cementing ties with Russia, a long-time ally.
The gas deal is likely to be signed during a visit by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to Belgrade early in June — a rare visit by a ranking Kremlin official to a European country since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began on 24 February.
Vučić said he told Putin that he wished "peace would be established as soon as possible".
Serbia is almost entirely dependent on Russian gas, and its main energy companies are under Russian majority ownership.
"What I can tell you is that we have agreed on the main elements that are very favourable for Serbia," Vučić told reporters.
"We agreed to sign a three-year contract, which is the first element of the contract that suits the Serbian side very well."
It is not clear how Serbia would receive the Russian gas if the EU decides to shut off the Russian supply that travels over its member countries. Russia has already cut off gas exports to EU members Finland, Poland and Bulgaria.
The EU as a whole has been hurriedly reducing its reliance on Russian energy since the invasion and is set to
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