IRAN-ARMENIA PIPELINE INAUGURATED
ARMENPRESS
Mar 19 2007
YEREVAN, MARCH 19, ARMENPRESS: Armenian and Iranian presidents Robert
Kocharian and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad inaugurated today a newly constructed
pipeline that will transfer Iranian natural gas to Armenia.
Officials of Iran Gas Company, Iranian and Armenian contractors and
representatives of both governments and media attended the ceremony.
A helicopter that was carrying the Iranian president to the border
town of Meghri in Armenia could not land due to bad weather, according
to IRNA news agency. It said the copter turned back to the Iranian
border city of Marand, from where the president and his entourage
traveled to Armenia by land.
The pipeline has a total length of 140 kilometers, 100 kilometers
of which is in Iranian territory and 40 kilometers in Armenian
territory. It will transfer 10 million cubic meters of Iranian natural
gas to Armenia per day in its initial phase.
The pipeline has an approximate cost of USD 120 million, 85 percent
of which was financed by the Export Development Bank of Iran (EDBI)
and the remaining 15 percent put up by Yerevan.
Inauguration of the pipeline will allow transfer of 400 million cubic
meters of Iranian gas to Armenia per year during the first phase of
the project, this figure later will increase to 2.5 billion cubic
meters per year.
The Armenian president had high praises for Iranian engineers and
workers who made this pipeline a reality.