LUKOIL INTENDS TO BUILD RETAIL PETROL SERVICE STATIONS IN MACEDONIA

Tuesday, June 14, 2005

Vagit Alekperov, President of LUKOIL, and Vlado Buckovski, Prime Minister of Macedonia, signed Memorandum of cooperation in Saint-Petersburg today in the presence of Sergey Mironov, Chairman of the Council of Federation of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation.

The Memorandum provides for development of cooperation in the investment projects implementation for the oil products market infrastructure enhancement in Macedonia.

To this effect, in the near future LUKOIL will register LUKOIL-Macedonia, its subsidiary for oil products import and sales, in Scopje, Macedonian capital. As per the approved business plan, LUKOIL intends to build a network of retail petrol service stations in Macedonia within three years.

“Intention to build our own sales infrastructure in Macedonia complies with the development plans of our Company in the Balkan countries region where the position of our Company in the downstream sector is already strong enough”, Vagit Alekperov, LUKOIL President, said on the issue.