South Stream Key in Talks Between Miller and Bulgarian Energy Chief

Russian energy company Gazprom met Bulgarian executives to discuss implementation of the South Stream gas pipeline.

Gazprom's chief executive officer,  Alexei Miller, met Dimitar Gogov, of Bulgarian gas company Bulargaz, in Moscow last week.

Both sides, Gazprom said in a statement, "laid stress on the successful implementation of the South Stream project."

Gazprom officials had a recent ground-breaking ceremony for construction of the South Stream pipeline, which would move Russian gas to southern Europe.

Doubts have emerged over the project's implementation, however. Marlene Holzner, a spokeswoman for European Energy Commissioner Gunter Oettinger, told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty last week that Gazprom hasn't offered any formal declaration about the pipeline's route.

South Stream is meant to diversify Russia's gas export options and avoid geopolitically sensitive transit routes in Ukraine. Europe aims to break the Russian grip on the regional energy sector through a network of pipelines dubbed the Southern Corridor. In a statement at the launch of construction last week, Miller said it was "a new reliable system of Russian gas supplies to European consumers".