Oil and gas pipelines spur closer ties among Black Sea countries at regional meeting
AP Worldstream
Apr 22, 2005
Senior diplomats and energy officials from the troubled Caucasus and
Black Sea regions gathered Friday to forge closer cooperation with
Greece and Turkey _ spurred by recent oil pipeline and energy deals.
A declaration to be signed Saturday aims at expanding energy and
trade ties among 12 countries that have often viewed their neighbors
with hostility.
“When markets cooperate more closely and companies form joint
ventures there is pressure on politicians to cooperate too,” Evripidis
Stylianidis, Greece’s overseas trade minister, told The Associated
Press.
The meeting follows an April 12 agreement between Bulgaria, Greece
and Russia to build a 285-kilometer (177-mile) Balkan pipeline _
the latest major venture planned to speed up the transfer of oil and
gas from the former Soviet Union to western markets.
Worth more than Aâ~B¬500 million (US$650 million), the Balkan oil
pipeline will bypass Turkey’s busy Bosphorus strait, linking Bulgaria’s
port of Burgas to Greece’s Alexandroupolis.
“Pipeline development is positive,” Stylianidis said. “It’s good for
the West, which will get cheaper oil, and good for the region because
better relationships grow between the countries on the pipeline route.”
Greece is currently chairing the Organization of Black Sea
Economic Cooperation, a regional trade forum founded in 1992, which
includes Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Georgia, Moldova,
Serbia-Montenegro, Romania, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine.
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