The Committee Meeting convened in Bucharest and was hosted by the Government of Romania.

The governments of five countries expressed their commitment to engage in developing the necessary gas interconnections to ensure that Nabucco can also supply the countries in the Southern and Central-North dimension of Europe.

"The State Parties call on the European Council, which will meet on 22 May to address the completion of the Internal Energy Market, to note the wider potential of Nabucco to provide access to new sources of gas for promoting growth and competition at the European level", the report said. The State Parties also approached the European Commission to continue to provide the project with the necessary regulatory and technical assistance.

The participants at the Committee Meeting also welcomed the progress of the project since the previous committee meeting was held in Budapest in April, and the work done by the authorities in the transit countries to ensure the successful implementation of the project.
In particular they highlighted the efforts of the Nabucco Tax Subcommittee to align taxation issues under the Nabucco Intergovernmental Agreement and its detailed recommendation regarding the application of the tax provisions under the Agreement.

States Parties now have an expert basis from within the Nabucco Committee to complete the necessary tax instruments or agreements under their domestic legal order.

The declaration also highlights the complementarity of the Nabucco and TANAP (Trans Anatolian Pipeline) projects, and welcomed the progress made in the realization of TANAP by the Turkish and Azerbaijani authorities. Delegations from both countries were also present at the meeting.

According to Nabucco Gas Pipeline International GmbH CEO, Reinhard Mitschek, the project has reached several milestones since the Budapest Nabucco committee meeting. He also stressed that Nabucco is the shortest route to the markets of South Eastern Europe, and remains the best option to open the Southern Gas Corridor.

Nabucco West is a short-cut version of Nabucco project, which provides for construction of a pipeline from the Turkish-Bulgarian border to Austria. Gas to be produced within the second phase of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas condensate field development is considered as the main source for the project.

Currently the Shah Deniz consortium is considering two options for transporting its gas to the European markets - Nabucco West and TAP (Trans Adriatic Pipeline). The final decision on the European pipeline is expected to be made by late June 2013.

Nabucco West project`s current shareholders are Bulgarian Energy Holding, Romanian Transgaz, Turkish Botas, Austrian OMV and Hungary`s FGSZ.

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