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FYI, don't know if you want to see these or FTI is monitoring but I got this on my Google Alerts - clearly riddled with errors - starting with headline.

http://macedoniaonline.eu/

MINA Breaking News


The Ukrainian company Burisma, now run by Hunter Biden, son of the US Vice President, Joe Biden, is one of the interested companies to partake in the bid for the Skopje gasification project, daily Dnevnik reports.

Burisima is one of the biggest privately-owned companies in Ukraine in the oil and gas business. Besides distributing blue fuel, the company also exploits it in three key basins in the country, in the valley of the Dnieper River, the Carpathian Mountains and the Crimea basin, which are the most industrially developed regions in the country.

Extended deadline for applications

Joe Biden’s son Hunter, who is a Yale graduate with an impressive biography, became the company’s director in April this year, along with, according to foreign media, his friend and colleague of the same University, Devon Archer. Besides them, Aleksander Kwasniewski, former president of Poland, is also in the Board of Directors. Head of the company as of last year is Alain Apter, who was working for 27 years in the banking sector, among others, in the Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley banks.

So far, companies from Ukraine, Turkey, Italy and Macedonia have shown interest in this strategic project. The domestic company is planning to partner a foreign company that meets the required criteria for participation in the public call, namely, at least 5 years of experience in operating natural gas distribution systems in urban environments, at least 40,000 users and a total annual income of at least EUR 40 million.

The Turkish company interested in the gasification project is Akso Energy, which is the second largest enterprise in Turkey in the gas sector. It is the largest private distributor of natural gas, which comprises 20 gas distribution networks and over a half a million users. At the same time, the company distributes electricity and is the biggest independent electricity producer in Turkey. Among others, the firms is also one of the owners of the wind power plant with a total capacity of 131 megawatts.

Recently, an Italian company asked for the tender documentation, which is one of the three companies that operate in neighboring Bulgaria, where the gasification is regionally divided.

The Government passed a decision to extend the deadline for the interested companies in this project for a month, which now expires on June 26. To attract more interested parties, Dnenvik has learnt, an internet presentation of the project with a video-conference call for participation will be released and direct invitations will be sent to a number of firms in this business. The presentation will offer specific answers related to the Skopje gasification project to the companies.

After the deadline for submission of applications, a dialogue procedure will take place with all companies that have shown interest.

A 175-kilometer network

The future partner will be tasked to build the primary and secondary natural gas distribution network, to invest in installing plug-ins to the final users, i.e. public institutions, residential and commercial users, including regulation and measurement equipment, to distribute the natural gas, to manage the distribution system, to maintain and develop the distribution system, to invest in its adaptation, etc.

The contractor will have to build 175-kilometer network in the first 5 years, which is 51% coverage in urban municipalities and 20% in suburbs. The estimates say that in 2016, the users will start receiving natural gas.

Biden Junior executes multiple functions

Hunter Biden’s biography says that besides owning several big companies, he is associate professor at the Georgetown University master program, at the School for Foreign Services. At the moment, he is President of the US World Food Program and Director of the non-profit board at the National Policy Center, the national safety project dubbed Truman and the US Global Leadership Coalition. He is also a member of CSIS, the Executive Development Committee, President of the counseling board at the National Democratic Institute and President of the counseling board of catholic humanitarian organizations in Washington.

He is founder and member of the lawyer firm Oldaker, Biden and Belair, and was appointed Executive Director of E-Trade by former President Bill Clinton, during the term of the Trade Secretary William Daily. Biden was a Senior Vice President of MBNA, an American bank. He is also a member of the US Supreme Court and the Federal Court for Federal Demands.


Eric D. Schwerin
eschwerin@rosemontseneca.com

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