Rosen Hristov: Bulgaria is not using its contract with "Botash" enough, Russian gas is being delivered to the country again

"The figures of the contract with Botash are a state secret. No one in the world discusses such figures. No one exports state and commercial secrets." This is what the former acting Minister of Energy Rosen Hristov said in the program "Face to Face".

"The contract for access to infrastructure in Turkey of the service package is absolutely competitive with the contract for the use of the Greek terminals. The amounts are absolutely comparable," he added.

"Everything we engage, we pay regardless of whether we use it. The contract was not signed by the state, but by the Bulgargaz company. The poor state of the company is related to the market share and volumes of gas that are traded. The government let traders bring in Russian gas at lower prices and push Bulgargaz out of market share. The future of Bulgargaz was in the international market. Now insane transit fees were imposed, which did not collect a single lev, they removed them, but turned all the countries against us," emphasized Rosen Hristov.

“I want to know where we are going to get gas from? We have 1 billion from Azerbaijan. And the remaining 2 billion cubic meters? We cannot deliver such quantities from Greece. We import 1 billion from Azerbaijan. I want to know where the other gas in Bulgaria comes from - it comes from Russia. All those who call themselves Euro-Atlantic are sponsoring Russia. We have a contract with "Botash" and may import non-Russian gas. There is no way a tanker from Norway can be overloaded somewhere. It is easy to trace and request a certificate of origin. Intermediaries make billions, and we pay the bill," added the former Minister of Energy.

According to him, at the moment, according to the contract with Botash, Bulgartransgaz is profiting from leasing the infrastructure with Turkey, which was not used before, and Bulgargaz was supposed to sell 1.5 billion cubic meters of natural gas to Romania, Hungary, Serbia and other countries.

"When we don't, Botash sells. The key question is - why don't we use the contract? If we want to have energy security, we need diversification," he explained.