The first joint of a trunk gas pipeline between the Altai territory and the Republic of Altai was welded on Monday, a source at Gazprom Transgaz Tomsk told Itar-Tass. “The company is building the trunk gas pipeline between Barnaul, Biisk and Gorno-Altaisk with an extension to the Altai resort of Belokurikha. It will build a gas distributing station in the village of Maima for the pipeline's segment between Smolenskoye and Gorno-Altaisk, and lay a line across the rivers of Katun and Isha,” he said. Gazprom Deputy CEO Alexander Ananenkov promised on October 22, 2007, when a gas distributing station in Belokurikha opened, that natural gas would be supplied to Gorno-Altaisk in 2008. The construction of the pipeline began in 2000.