Baku, Ankara reach deal on natural gas

Published: May 3, 2011

ISTANBUL, Turkey, May 3 (UPI) — Turkey and Azerbaijan signed an
agreement on the price and quantity of natural gas from the giant
offshore Shah Deniz field, a minister said.

Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz signed a gas deal with his Azeri
counterpart Natiq Aliyev on the sidelines of a regional conference in
Istanbul.

Yildiz was quoted by Turkish daily newspaper Today’s Zaman as saying
both sides “reached an agreement over the price and quantity of gas to
be exported from the Shah Deniz II project, which will go online in
2017, to Turkey.”

Turkey gets about 210 billion cubic feet of natural gas per year from
Azerbaijan and some of that volume heads to Greek markets. Yildiz didn’t
give specifics on the deal other than to say some of it would be
exported to European countries.

Both countries are pivotal to European plans to build the Nabucco gas
pipeline. That project is meant to break the Russian grip on the
European energy sector, though the pipeline is slow to reach formal
agreements with potential suppliers.

© 2011 United Press International, Inc.

From: A. Papazian