Iran voices interest in increasing gas export to Azerbaijan

Tehran, Iran, Jan. 18 By Kamyar Eghbal – Trend: Iran has expressed interest in increasing the volume of its gas exports to Azerbaijan. Voicing Iran’s readiness to increase the gas exports to Azerbaijan, Amirhossein Zamaninia, deputy oil minister for international affairs, described the regional and neighboring countries as the “best trade partners and markets” for Iran. "The talks between Iran and Azerbaijan in this regard have not been finalized so far," he told Trend. The deputy minister touched upon talks between the two countries on cooperation in the issue of the development of oil and gas fields and blocs in the Caspian Sea, saying the sides had proper talks regarding the issue, which can improve in future. He also described Oman, Iraq and Turkey as “proper gas markets”, saying Iran has held talks with Turkey regarding the plans to increase exports of gas. Turkey’s gas imports from Iran in January-October 2017 stood at 7.6 billion cubic meters (bcm), according to Turkey’s Energy Market Regulatory Body. Zamaninia added that talks are underway to improve gas cooperation between Iran and Oman. He said that Iran currently exports about 35-36 million cubic meters of gas per day. By the end of 2017, about 280 million cubic meters of gas were supplied to Azerbaijan from Iran for the needs of the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. In January-July 2017, the Azerbaijani state-owned SOCAR imported 970 million cubic meters of gas from Iran. Subscribers of Trend News Agency can read this and other exclusive materials before they are published in open access. More information on Trend’s news products can be found here. Follow Trend on Telegram. Only most interesting and important news