Romania raids NIS Petrol offices, opens criminal probe

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Romania raids NIS Petrol offices, opens criminal probe

An employee walks at the office of Gazprom Neft company in Khanty-Mansiysk.

BUCHAREST Reuters -- Romanian authorities raided employees' homes and the Romanian unit of Serbian NIS Petrol, controlled by Russia's Gazprom Neft, and opened a criminal investigation into allegations of confidential data leaks, the prosecutors said.

The company was not immediately responding to Reuters, and Gazprom Neft referred Reuters to NIS Petrol for comment.

The anti-organised crime prosecutors said late on Monday that they raided the company's offices and nine employees' homes in the capital Bucharest and the western Romanian city of Timisoara in a case that exposed secrets and the unauthorised transfer of digital data. Four Nis Petrol employees were under criminal investigation for allegedly failing to comply with Romania's fuels law and the national agency for mineral resources' ANRM regulations.

They also alleged that they sent non-public data about mineral reserves to their Serbian mother company.

The statement didn't say whether those under investigation had been detained.

NIS Petrol holds concessions for oil and gas exploration and extraction in Romania and operates a network of petrol stations in the western part of the country under the Gazprom brand.