US extends sanctions on Serbian oil industry for third time

The United States has postponed the entry into force of American sanctions against the Serbian Oil Industry (NIS) for two months, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić announced on Saturday.

The sanctions were supposed to come into effect on April 28, but have been postponed until June 27, Vucic said on Instagram.

"Good news for the citizens of Serbia. Serbia has managed to obtain a new postponement of sanctions against NIS, this time for two months, until June 27. Thank you to our American partners for understanding Serbia's position," Vučić said.

The United States placed NIS on its sanctions list on January 10 due to its ownership stake in the Russian company, Gazprom Neft, in order to prevent Russia from using revenues from the energy sector for the war in Ukraine.

Since then, Washington has postponed the entry into force of its sanctions against NIS three times.

NIS announced this week that it had applied to the US Treasury Department for a special license to suspend the implementation of sanctions against it.

The Serbian government had also requested that the US authorities postpone the sanctions.

Russian companies, Gazprom Neft and Gazprom, own the majority of shares in NIS (56.15 percent), while Serbia owns almost a third of the shares.

In 2008, Serbia sold 51 percent of the shares of the NIS company to the Russian state-owned company, Gazprom Neft, for a price of 400 million euros, without a tender.

In May 2022, due to new sanctions announced by the European Union, Gazprom Neft sold six percent of its shares to Gazprom, the parent company that is not yet under sanctions by the European bloc.

NIS is the only company in Serbia that deals with the exploration, production and processing of oil, as well as the production of natural gas.

It owns more than 400 gas stations in Serbia and in countries in the region – Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania and Bulgaria.

Crude oil processing is carried out at the Pančevo Oil Refinery, which operates within the NIS system./ REL