The refinery in the northern Serbian city of Pancevo is expected to resume operations within days, Serbian Minister of Mining and Energy Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic said. She explained that on the morning of January 13, the first shipment of crude oil would arrive in Serbia via the Adriatic oil pipeline JANAF. This means that the Pancevo refinery is expected to restart operations around January 16 and release its first domestically produced diesel onto the market around January 26 or 27, local media reported.
On January 1, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said he expected the Pancevo refinery of Serbia’s oil company NIS to be fully operational on January 17, 18 or 19. He also voiced expectations that Russia and Hungary would reach an agreement on the purchase of the Russian stake in NIS before the company’s operating license expires on January 23.
On December 31, 2025, the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued a license to the Adriatic oil pipeline JANAF, allowing it to continue transporting oil for Serbia’s oil company NIS until January 23, 2026.
In early January 2025, the United States announced that, due to the war in Ukraine and what it described as “secondary risk”, it would impose sanctions on NIS, Serbia’s only oil company, which is majority-owned by the Russian oil giant Gazprom. At the time, Washington demanded a complete withdrawal of Russian capital from the company, while the Russian side agreed to a sale only in November of the same year.
Also in November 2025, Hungary’s MOL announced interest in acquiring part of the Russian stake in the Serbian company. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban discussed the potential deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin during his visit to Moscow in late November 2025.
The Serbian state holds 29.9% of NIS shares, while the main shareholder remains Gazprom Neft with 44.9%. In late September, the St. Petersburg-based company Intelligence, linked to Gazprom, acquired an 11.3% stake previously held by Gazprom, the parent company.
NIS was placed under US sanctions on January 10, 2025, which entered into force on October 9, 2025, after being postponed eight times.
On December 2, 2025, NIS announced that it had begun shutting down production facilities at the Pancevo refinery due to a shortage of crude oil.