Gazprom holds South Stream talks with Eni

MOSCOW, Nov. 11 (UPI) -- Executives from Italian giant Eni and Russian gas monopoly Gazprom met in Moscow to discuss the preliminary framework for the South Stream gas pipeline.

Alexei Miller, chief executive of Gazprom, hosted his Eni counterpart, Paolo Scaroni, at Gazprom headquarters in Moscow to approve joint developments on the pre-investment stage of South Stream.

Moscow includes South Stream, along with its Nord Stream counterpart, as part of a plan to ease the transit burden on Ukraine, which hosts the bulk of the Russian gas bound for Europe currently. A January row between Kiev and Moscow sparked a gas crisis that still haunts the regional energy sector.

Russian gas monopoly Gazprom signed a series of South Stream initiatives with the Bulgarian, Greek and Serbian governments in May and has similar arrangements under way with Slovenia and Austria.

South Stream AG was incorporated in 2008 as a joint company of Gazprom and Eni. Italy is the third-largest importer of Russian gas in Europe.

Eni said another round of talks was scheduled for Dec. 11 in Venice.