After the start of the war between Russia and Ukraine, we received applications from more than 10 European countries with a request to either increase or start gas supplies to Europe, the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev said on November 25 at the international conference “Along the Middle Corridor: Geopolitics, Security and Economics.”
The Azerbaijani side is currently considering these applications. “Right now we don’t have enough gas to satisfy all of them. Therefore, we need to immediately start commercial negotiations, mainly with countries that already receive Azerbaijani gas, because the pipelines are already functioning and the necessary legal framework exists,” the head of state said.
Speaking about the plan to expand the geography of gas supplies, Ilham Aliyev said that Azerbaijan fully supports European initiatives to build interconnectors. “The laying of one of them – Greece-Bulgaria – took place in October in Sofia, where I was also present. The second one between Bulgaria and Serbia will be ready next year. We are also actively working with the Albanian government on the issue of investments in the gas distribution network of Albania, since such a network does not exist in the country,” the President of Azerbaijan stressed.
He explained that Albania is currently only a transit country for Azerbaijani gas. But they also need gas to meet local needs. The President also spoke about the Ionian-Adriatic gas pipeline project, which will cover three Balkan countries (Albania, Montenegro and Croatia). However, according to him, for its implementation, it is necessary to involve all participants in this process so that they take the necessary steps in this direction.
Caspian Barrel
