* Beats previous record from 2016 by 8.1%: Miller
* Russian gas supply to Germany hits record 53.4 Bcm
* All-time high deliveries to Austria, Netherlands Russia's Gazprom supplied a total of 193.9 Bcm of gas to Europe and Turkey in 2017, its CEO Alexei Miller said Wednesday, easily breaking the record set in the previous year.
Miller, cited by Russian news agency Tass, said deliveries to the "Far Abroad," which includes Europe and Turkey but not the countries of the former Soviet Union, were 8.1% higher than 2016's 179.3 Bcm.
"The trend of record yearly records demonstrates the growing demand of European countries for Russian gas on the one hand and the reliability of our supplies in the required volumes on the other," Miller said.
Russian supplies to Germany and northwest Europe are likely to remain at elevated levels through the winter as the oil-indexed contract price range remains well below the TTF month-ahead price until April.
Supplies to Germany hit a record of 53.4 Bcm last year, Miller said, a 7.1% year-on-year increase.
Gazprom's supplies to Austria, the Netherlands and Denmark also hit new record highs in 2017, he said.
Austria bought 8.5 Bcm last year, a 40% year on year increase, while the Netherlands was supplied with 4.6 Bcm, up 9.7% year on year.
Gazprom delivered 1.75 Bcm of gas to Denmark, up 1.9% year on year.
The previous records to Austria, the Netherlands and Denmark were set in 2005, 2007 and 2016, respectively.
Russian gas supplies also rose to France by 6.8% to 12.3 Bcm, to the Czech Republic by 28% to 5.8 Bcm and to Slovakia by 24.5% to 4.6 Bcm.
Demand for Russian gas was strong across Europe in early 2017 due to cold weather and remained robust through the summer and autumn given the need to refill storage stocks -- especially in Germany and the Netherlands -- which fell to historically low levels last winter.
