Russian gas giant Gazprom announced on December 29 it had purchased all of its foreign partners' shares in the abandoned South Stream gas pipeline project.
The Russian company said in a statement, "Gazprom has today concluded an agreement with [Italy's] Eni, [Germany's] Wintershall, and [France's] EDF involving the acquisition from them of 50 percent of the South Stream Transport B.V. company."
Gazprom already owns the other 50 percent of shares in the project.
Wintershall parent company BASF said the price Gazprom paid was sufficient to compensate for the money the German company had invested in the project.
South Stream was abandoned at the start of December amid growing European Union opposition to the project.
The project aimed to bring some 63 billion cubic meters of Russian gas via a pipeline along the bottom of the Black Sea, through southeastern Europe to Austria.