INTERVIEW-Greece agrees to join South Stream pipeline-Minister

By Karolos Grohmann

ATHENS, April 15 (Reuters) - Greece has agreed to join the Kremlin-backed South Stream gas pipeline project, further boosting energy ties with Russia, Greece's Development Minister Christos Folias said on Tuesday.

The pipeline, which will be jointly built by Gazprom (GAZP.MM) and Italy's ENI (ENI.MI), will eventually take 30 billion cubic metres (bcm) of Russian gas a year to southern Europe, with Greece becoming a transit state on the southern arm of the pipeline pumping gas to Italy.

Analysts have said the project, which aims to link Gazprom's Siberian gas fields with Europe and is seen as a competitor to the EU, U.S.-backed Nabucco pipeline, will cost around 10 billion euros ($15.82 billion).

"We have agreed to be part of the South Stream project," Folias told Reuters in an interview. "We are now discussing technical details to formulate a document that we can then sign. The political will is there from both sides (Russia and Greece). That is a given."

Folias said he did not view the long-stalled Nabucco pipeline, designed to eventually pump 25-30 bcm a year from Turkey to Austria, as a competitor to the South Stream project, which will run from Russia via a 900-km underwater pipeline across the Black Sea to Europe.

"I don't want to see them as athletes competing against each other," he said. "I would say they are complementing each other and are offering Europe multiple energy providers, which is good."

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