Today in Berlin, the Gazprom delegation headed by Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Company's Management Committee took part in the celebrations marking the 20th anniversary of cooperation with BASF and Wintershall Holding.

“The two-decade partnership of Gazprom, BASF and Wintershall Holding represent a model of successful joint business. Over this period, we managed to tackle a number of challenges: we commenced joint development of difficult to access Achimov deposits in the Urengoy field, started construction of the most important for the European market gas pipeline project – Nord Stream.

Today Gazprom and Wintershall Holding cooperate across the natural gas value chain – from upstream to downstream. Our relations are based on the mutual trust and respect. A growing number of our employees and business partners become good friends. Surely, looking ahead we have new success stories, even brighter and more exciting projects,” Alexey Miller said on the occasion of celebrations.

“It is clear today that the beginning of our cooperation in the gas industry became a historic event in the context of providing energy security to Europe. In the early 1990s, when Gazprom and BASF signed first agreements, nobody could imagine how successfully this partnership would be. Now we are really proud of the achieved results, and look forward optimistically. We are in for plenty of joint activities,” declared Dr. Jurgen Hambrecht, Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors of BASF SE.

Participating in the celebrations was also Gerhard Schroeder, former Chancellor of Germany and Chairman of the Nord Stream AG Shareholders' Committee.

“The cooperation between Gazprom and BASF has been developing with a great deal of success. The partnership of companies could serve as a decent example of developing the interaction of Germany and Europe with Russia.

We Europeans should concentrate all our efforts on strengthening economic and political ties with Russia. They would form a basis for mutual trust, security and stability of our future. In fact, Russia plays an essential role in ensuring global energy security,” said Gerhard Schroeder.

Background:

BASF SE is a leading petrochemical company running its business in the following main areas: production of chemicals, synthetic materials, plant protection products as well as production and transportation of hydrocarbons.

Wintershall Holding GmbH is a fully-owned BASF subsidiary operating in the power generation sector. Gazprom and Wintershall Holding GmbH set up WINGAS and WIEH joint ventures.

Gazprom partners BASF SE and Wintershall Holding GmbH in developing the Yuzhno-Russkoye oil and gas field, the first pilot block of the Achimov deposits in the Urengoy oil, gas and condensate fieldas well as constructing the Nord Stream gas pipeline.