MOSCOW, Dec 24: Russia and Serbia on Wednesday signed a deal on the sale of a 51 per cent stake in the Balkan country’s oil monopoly NIS to Russian gas giant Gazprom.The agreement was signed in the Kremlin following talks between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his visiting Serbian counterpart Boris Tadic, state television pictures showed.

As part of a wide-ranging deal, Serbia will allow the transit across its territory of the South Stream gas pipeline to transport Russian gas to southern Europe while Moscow will build an underground gas storage facility in Serbia.—AFP