Construction will begin next year on a pipeline to deliver gasoline and diesel fuel from Iran to ex-Soviet Armenia, Armenian Energy Minister Armen Movsisian said Monday.
The 300-kilometer (186-mile) pipeline will run from the Iranian city of Tabriz to the Armenian city of Eraskh, where a receiving terminal is also to be built, Movsisian said at a press conference.
"Armenia will receive petrol and diesel fuel from the oil refinery located in the Iranian city of Tabriz through the pipeline, construction of which starts next spring," he said.
Movsisian said the pipeline would take two years to complete, would cost $200 million-$240 million and would be jointly financed, with each country covering half the cost.
He said the project was part of efforts by Armenia to diversify its energy supplies, in particular after the war in neighboring Georgia in August disrupted Russian supplies to Armenia.
"In order to guarantee the country's energy security we are moving toward the diversification of energy supplies," he said.
Armenia and Iran last year inaugurated a 150-kilometer (93-mile) pipeline that was supposed to deliver 36 billion cubic metres (1.27 trillion cubic feet) of gas from Iran to Armenia over 20 years. But it has yet to start operations.
Landlocked Armenia has sought closer links with Iran in recent years.
It suffers from an economic blockade imposed by neighbors Azerbaijan and Turkey over the disputed Nagorny Karabakh region and its efforts to gain recognition of Ottoman-era mass killings of Armenians as genocide.