Greece is seeking to become a European energy hub by securing gas and oil agreements with Russia, its deputy foreign minister told the RIA Novosti news agency Monday.
"Both Burgas-Alexandropolis and South Stream are the unchanged priorities in our policy," Dimitris Droutsas said. "We are taking all the necessary steps to complete them as soon as possible."
The former is a project to pump 257 million barrels of Russian and Caspian oil a year from the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Burgas to the Greek Aegean port of Alexandroupolis. The latter is a Russian-Italian project to enable Russian gas to be pumped to European without using transit countries such as Ukraine.
Droutsas also said Greece would use its position as chair of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe to further discussions on a Russian proposal for a European security pact. The pact was proposed by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in June 2008.
Droutsas said the discussions would continue at an OSCE meeting to be held in Athens Dec. 1-2.