Greece seeking corridor to transport Azeri gas

Athens is interested in creating an energy corridor between Azerbaijan, Turkey, Greece and Italy to take Azerbaijani gas to European markets, Greek Minister of Development Christos Folias has said on a visit to Baku.

“Azerbaijan and Greece take the same position in this respect,” Folias told the press after meeting with Minister of Energy and Industry Natig Aliyev.

He said Greece was looking to buy 1 billion cubic meters of gas a year from Azerbaijan and that the resource-rich South Caucasus republic had capabilities to supply this volume.

As for joining the Moscow-backed South Stream project to follow Hungary, Bulgaria and Serbia’s suit, Folias said this was a preliminary agreement that was still in the initial stages.

South Stream is an alternative to the West-backed NABUCCO project that envisions building a $6 billion, 3,300-km pipeline by 2012 to transport gas from the Caspian region and Central Asia to Europe, via Turkey and the Balkans, by-passing Russia. The route is supposed to export Central Asian and Russian gas.

Aliyev said there were some problems with the transportation of Azerbaijan’s gas to Greece.

“There is no inter-governmental agreement between Azerbaijan and Turkey on transit, which is impeding the transportation of gas to Greece through Turkey. This issue should be solved first,” the minister said.

He added that matters concerning the purchase and sale of gas between the two countries have yet to be resolved as well.

Ankara wants concessions for the transit of gas produced from Azerbaijan’s offshore field Shahdaniz and refuses to purchase gas for European prices.*