It hasn't been decided if the planned South Stream gas pipeline from Russia to southern Europe will have a branch that passes through Serbia, a spokeswoman for pipeline developer South Stream AG said Thursday, contradicting previous statements from a person in the Serbian government. 

"We are studying different routes for the South Stream pipeline. Final decisions on the route will be based on the technical, economic and commercial feasibility studies that we are carrying out and that we expect to complete by the end of the year," the spokeswoman said. 

A person in Serbia's government told Dow Jones Newswires this week that Russian gas monopoly OAO Gazprom (GAZP.RS) has guaranteed it would pump 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year through Serbian territory via the planned South Stream pipeline. The full capacity of the pipeline is expected to be around 30 billion cubic meters a year. 

Gazprom has also guaranteed to pump 300 million cubic meters of gas a year into storage, with a possible increase to 850 billion cubic meters, the person said. 

This is part of a wider agreement this week that will give Gazprom control of Serbia's national energy company Naftna Industrija Srbija, or NIS. 

South Stream AG is a Swiss-based company recently incorporated by Italian oil company Eni SpA (E) and Gazprom on a 50-50 basis for the development of the pipeline. 

The 900-kilometer pipeline would run under the Black Sea from Novorossisk in Russia to Burgas in Bulgaria. A branch of the pipeline is likely to run from Bugaria through Greece and into Italy, where Eni has long-term gas supply contracts with Gazprom.

• A Permanent Economic Emergency