The European Union is in talks with Azerbaijan on providing gas to
supply a key pipeline aimed at reducing Europe's dependence on Russian
supplies, the bloc's energy chief said Tuesday.
"It is important for us to diversify gas routes to Europe.
We are interested in deliveries of Azerbaijani gas and negotiations on this are
ongoing," E.U. Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs told a gas conference
in the Azerbaijani capital, Baku.
Azerbaijan is seen as a
crucial potential provider for the Nabucco pipeline, a 3,300-kilometer pipeline
between Turkey and Austria
scheduled to be completed by 2014.
The pipeline is aimed at reducing European reliance on Russian gas supplied
through Ukraine - a route
that has seen chronic interruptions amid payment disputes between Moscow and Kiev.
Piebalgs said that the signing of a milestone accord on the pipeline between Austria, Bulgaria,
Hungary, Romania and Turkey in
July had left no doubts about the E.U.'s commitment to the much delayed,
EUR7.9-billion project.
"All of the political sides of this question have been resolved and now
only commercial questions remain," he said.
He said the E.U. was also seeking to cooperate with Central Asian states,
including gas-rich Turkmenistan,
in supplying Nabucco.
The head of Azerbaijani state energy firm SOCAR, Rovnag Abdullayev, told the
conference his country was keen to work out a deal on gas supplies with E.U.
states.
"The political aspects are already behind us and now the priority is
commercial questions," he said. "We are conducting commercial
negotiations with participants in the Nabucco project and hope that these
negotiations will end successfully."