Between the Greek government and SOCAR (the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan) there are new frictions over acquisition of gas transmission company DESFA.
According to www.capital.gr, one of frictions – tariff policy, which among others affects the income from DESFA sale to foreign investors.
So, the Energy Ministry of Greece has made a number of amendments to the DESFA tariff policy without foreign investors’ consultations. The Greece media believes that commencement of tariff policy amendments may compromise the company privatization.
According to some reports, the SOCAR insisted on the DESFA value adjustment in case of any changes in the company assets. As a whole, the Greek government seeks to change the DESFA privatization model and to accept instruction on the sale of minority stake to a strategic investor over MOMCC model that may withdraw the SOCAR from negotiations,” web-portal writes.
The SOCAR was ready to buy 66% of DESFA assets, but the deal was frozen by the European Committee on Competition Issues, which insists on assets resale by the Azerbaijani company (at least 17%) to European investors.
“The Italian company Snam has an interest in buying of 17% DESFS assets from 66% stake, which was signed by SOCAR, and it may be a situation that in the end the Italian company will control the DESFA,” the Greek media writes.
Previously, the SOCAR representatives said that the DESFA issue will be resolved by the end of 2016 – the beginning of 2017.
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