TURIN, Italy, May 1 (UPI) -- Italian automaker Fiat is buying a 70-percent stake in Zastava, the Serbian car maker, for $1.09 billion.
Serbia, which will control the other 30 percent, will plow another $156 million over the next two years, the Serb news agency Tanjung reported Wednesday.
Fiat Chief Executive Officer Sergio Marchionne said the joint venture ''represents a further step in Fiat's growth strategy," the Italian news agency ANSA reported.
''It is also a demonstration of our confidence in Serbia, in its industrial sector, managerial and worker capacity, as well as in the Serb automobile market, which we consider to be an extension and an integral part of our own domestic market,'' Marchionne said in Turin.
Fiat has had a decades-long relationship with the Serbian company. Besides producing Fiat's Punto model, Zastava makes the Opel Astra under license from General Motors' German subsidiary. The company also has a military and sporting weapons division.
