Gas network plan to link up eastern Europe

Mol, the Hungarian oil and gas company facing a takeover bid from OMV of Austria, has proposed a merger of the gas transmission businesses of eight countries in central and south-east Europe to form a new $10bn company that could be floated on the stock market. The radical project, given the working name of the New Europe Transmission System, would create one of the biggest gas networks in Europe. It would bring together the pipeline systems of Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Austria.