Russia and Greece on Friday signed a preliminary agreement to set up a joint venture to build a pipeline through Greece, a spokeswoman for the Russian energy ministry said.

The two countries will jointly own the venture, ministry spokeswoman Olga Golant told AFP. Russian gas giant Gazprom had earlier proposed footing the bill for building a Greek pipeline extension of the Russia-Turkish energy venture TurkStream, which aims to deliver gas to Europe while bypassing Ukraine.