AHMADINEJAD OPEN FIRST STRETCH OF ARMENIAN GAS PIPELINE FROM IRAN
The Associated Press
International Herald Tribune, France
March 19 2007
YEREVAN, Armenia: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his
Armenian counterpart on Monday formally opened the first Armenian
section of a natural gas pipeline linking the two countries.
Ahmadinejad and Armenian President Robert Kocharian inaugurated the
40-kilometer (25-mile) section in the town of Meghri, just over the
border from Iran.
"This is more proof of our friendship," Kocharian said at the ceremony,
which was delayed by hours because rain and fog prevented a helicopter
flight that was to transport Ahmadinejad. He arrived by road.
Under the first stage of the project, Iran is to deliver up to 400
million cubic meters (14 billion cubic feet) of gas a year; when the
pipeline is completed and extends to the capital, Yerevan, the volume
could rise to 2.5 billion cubic meters (88 billion cubic feet) a year.
The project was launched in 2004 after more than a decade of
negotiations.
Russia, which supplies most of Armenia’s gas, had objected to the
project. Armenian officials said last year they were discussing the
prospect of Russia’s natural-gas monopoly Gazprom purchasing the
Armenian section of the pipeline from Iran.
Landlocked Armenia has developed its relations with Iran amid
economic troubles caused by the closing of its borders with Turkey
and Azerbaijan in the wake of the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh,
a region of Azerbaijan occupied by Armenian and ethnic Armenian
Karabakhi forces.
Iran has also sought projects and influence in other parts of the
former Soviet Union, mostly in Central Asia.
Last year, Ahmadinejad opened an Iranian-financed tunnel improving
connections between impoverished Tajikistan’s north and the capital
region. Tehran has focused mostly on transport and infrastructure
projects and restoring historically close cultural ties.