Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, June 3 / Trend , G.Hasanov/
Ashgabat hosted the meeting of the intergovernmental commission of Turkmenistan and Russia on economic cooperation to discuss the purchase and sale of Turkmen gas, an official Turkmen source said.
Vice Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov represented Russia at the meeting.
The export of Turkmen gas to Russia was suspended in early April 2009 because of the accident at the main gas pipeline Central Asia-Center (CAC). Last year Russia purchased slightly more than 40 billion cubic meters of gas. The Russian "Gazprom" put forward conditions before Turkmenistan to reduce the procurement or the cost of fuel, because demand in energy markets has fallen significantly due to world economic crisis. Ashgabat earlier stressed that the accident occurred due to the fault of the Russian side because of the drastic reduction of gas requires financial compensation, the authorities promised to appeal to the international arbitration.
Viktor Zubkov conveyed to President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov greetings from Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, the Altyn Asyr national channel reported.
"Cooperation with Russia has been and remains one of the strategic priorities of Turkmenistan's foreign policy ", Altyn Asyr quoted Berdymuhamedov as saying. "A high level of inter-state dialogue in recent years came to a new level thanks to the goodwill and efforts of the sides," he said.
Zubkov, commending the leadership of Turkmenistan's international initiatives, in particular, to ensure global energy security, said that "Russia sees a wide field for the resignation of mutual building and further the effective implementation of the general interest".
In this regard, he introduced the Russian initiative to make the traditional inter-state relations more stable. Turkmen leader noted the role of the intergovernmental commission to develop the most appropriate and effective mechanism for long-term cooperation.
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