Energy: Looking For Ways To Circumvent Russia

23 March 2007 [23:01] – Today.Az

Three meetings. Three cities. One goal: making Europe less dependent
on Russian energy.

On March 22, Azerbaijan’s foreign minister was in Washington,
Georgia’s prime minister was in Turkmenistan’s capital Ashgabat, and a
major energy conference opened in the Georgian capital Tbilisi.

Topping the agenda in all three cities were plans to develop
alternative oil and gas transport routes that circumvent Russia and
loosen Moscow’s stranglehold on Europe’s energy supplies.

This diplomatic flurry came just one week after Russian President
Vladimir Putin signed a deal with Greece and Bulgaria to build a
pipeline to transport Russian oil from the Black Sea to the Aegean en
route to European markets.

Federico Bordonaro, a Rome-based energy analyst, says today’s scramble
for control of energy transit routes is beginning to resemble the Cold
War struggle between Russia and the West.

"What we were used to during the Cold War years was a kind of security
dilemma," Bordonaro said. "Powers needed to choose between alliances
and between different security strategies. Something very similar is
apparently going on in the field of energy security."

Leading The Charge

In the middle of the scramble are Azerbaijan and Georgia, both of whom
are trying to break free from Russia’s sphere of influence and move
closer to Washington and Brussels.

"The small countries, like Georgia for example, that are very, very
important because of their function as energy corridors — they are
especially sensitive to the influence of big powers," Bordonaro said.

In Washington, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov and U.S.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice signed an agreement to cooperate
closely on energy issues.

Azerbaijan is emerging as a major natural gas producer. Mammadyarov
was seeking Washington’s political support to build a new generation
of gas pipelines to export Azerbaijani natural gas — via Georgia and
Turkey — to Europe.

U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian
Affairs Matthew Bryza said the agreement would support Europe’s stated
aim of diversifying its energy imports — and help Azerbaijan emerge
as a viable alternative to Russia’s natural gas giant, Gazprom.

"This high-level dialogue will aim to deepen and broaden already
strong cooperation among governments and companies to expand oil and
gas production in Azerbaijan for export to global markets," Bryza
said.

Particular focus, he said, will be put on the realization of the
Turkey-Greece-Italy gas pipeline, and potentially the Nabucco and
other pipelines that can delivery Azerbaijani gas to Europe and help
diversify its natural gas supplies.

Thinking Ahead

Meanwhile, in Tbilisi, Georgia was hosting an energy conference aiming
to achieve the exact same goal. Officials and industry leaders from
Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkey, and the United States attended.

Alexandre Khetaguri, the head of the Georgian International Oil and
Gas Corporation, told RFE/RL’s Georgian Service that presentations
focused on projects that could prove "potentially interesting in the
future."

These projects, he said, included Nabucco as well as the construction
of a trans-Caspian pipeline, which will ensure transportation of gas
from Central Asian countries to Europe.

Another project discussed in Tbilisi was the proposed
Georgia-Ukraine-European Union Gas Pipeline — or GUEU — which would
transport Azerbaijani gas to the EU via Georgia and Ukraine.

"This is a very strategic project for the whole area, starting from
Azerbaijan and Georgia," said Roberto Pirani, the chairman and
technical director of GUEU. "And from the European point of view, it’s
a diversification of supply into Eastern Europe. We’re talking about
Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania, which are totally dependent on supplies
from Gazprom. So this project will provide an alternative, more than
an alternative — a complimentary route of gas, a supply of gas — to
Gazprom."

Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Noghaideli, meanwhile, traveled to
Turkmenistan on March 22 to discuss gas imports.

According to media reports, Noghaideli was seeking to persuade Turkmen
officials to export natural gas to Europe via the South
Caucasus. Turkmenistan currently exports most of its natural gas via
Russia.

Bordonaro, the Rome-based energy analyst, says the struggle for
control of Turkmenistan’s gas will likely heat up in the coming
months.

"One of the major stakes in the next month will be Turkmenistan," he
said. "Because if a group of powers will be able to diversify the
direction of Turkmen gas reserves and to avoid Russia’s control of
virtually all of these reserves, this will be an important point for
these other powers, and for Georgia and Azerbaijan as well."

Divided On Diversification

Bordonaro said not all EU countries fully back efforts to diversify
Europe’s energy supplies away from Russia.

Most former communist countries like Poland and Lithuania are pushing
Brussels to circumvent Russia. But Germany and France still lean
toward making bilateral agreements with Moscow.

"Europe is proving unable to forge a really unitary energy security
strategy and this will also cause trans-Atlantic relations to suffer,"
Bordonaro said.

Earlier this month, Hungary decided to back expansion of Russia’s Blue
Stream pipeline. Gazprom plans to extend the pipeline under the Black
Sea to Hungary. According to the plan, Hungary would then serve as a
hub to transport Russian gas to Europe.

Some analysts say Hungary’s move could undermine the EU-backed Nabucco
pipeline proposal and other projects that were the subject of so much
talk in Washington, Tbilisi and Ashgabat this week. RFE/RL
From: Baghdasarian