LONDON (Dow Jones)--Russia's gas monopoly OAO Gazprom (GAZP.RS) is interested in taking a large stake in Serbia's national oil company Naftne Industrije Srbije, or NIS, the monopoly's Deputy Chairman Alexander Medvedev said Monday in an open letter to Serbian daily Politika.
Gazprom also wants to participate in the building of a gas pipeline through Serbia and in the construction of an underground gas storage in the country, he added.
"We have a long history of cooperation with Serbia, but we also see space to make that cooperation closer in the future, where everyone wins: Gazprom shareholders, Serbia and the rest of Europe," Medvedev wrote in attempt to support Gazprom's bid for NIS.
He names the construction of an underground gas storage at Banatski Dvor as a "potential project" and says that a branch of the South Stream gas pipeline might run through Serbia.
Medvedev stressed that nothing has been decided yet, and said a tentative understanding with Srbijagas, Serbia's gas monopoly, has been reached.
The South Stream gas pipeline is planned to run 900 kilometers under the Black Sea and is being developed jointly by Gazprom and Italy's Eni SpA (E), which signed a deal earlier this year.
Gazprom offered in 2007 to pay $400 million for 51% of NIS, without facing rival bidders.
However, Mladjan Dinkic, Serbia's economy minister, has called the offer to pay less than half of NIS's $1.2 billion book value "humiliating", even though Gazprom would also invest $500m from 2008 to 2012.
Serbia has announced plans to sell part of its oil giant, NIS, as part of ongoing economic reform, but Belgrade still has not decided whether to sell the majority stake or not.