Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, June 9 / Trend , G.Hasanov/
On June 22-25, Turkmen Vice-Premier and Foreign Minister Rashid Meredov will visit the United States to hold the negotiations on long-term partnership upon Turkmen President Gurbangulu Berdimuhammedov's instruction.
The West's interest to Turkmenistan's energy resources has considerably increased under the leadership of Berdimuhammedov, who led the country in 2007. It occurred, first, thanks to Ashgabat's policy on liberalizing the economy, gradually shifting to market relations and promising to restore citizens' rights in the Turkmen society.
In past years, official Ashgabat was connected with the United States with a series of giant energy projects, but all of them remained on the papers. The consortium led by the American PSG broke the Transcaspian pipeline project, as it did not find a compromise in finance issues. Moreover, Turkmenistan refused to allot a half of the pipeline's capacity to the Azerbaijani gas, discovered in the Shah Deniz at that time and argued that the project has been initially intended only for the Turkmen fuel. Another project in Pakistan failed due to worsening the situation in Afghanistan and the American Unocal also left the country. ExxonMobil which independently implemented the oil project in the western Turkmenistan closed its office, as well.
At present U.S. companies like Chevron, ConocoPhilips, Marathon, Midland Oil & Gas, which have already opened their offices in Ashgabat are interested in the Turkmen market, particularly the development of its part of the shelf of the Caspian Sea. At the last meeting of the government, Berdimuhammedov drew attention to "the need to strengthen ties with such power as the United States of America." Senior officials of the White House are frequent guests of the presidential palace in Ashgabat, and Secretary of State Special Envoy for Energy in Eurasia, Ambassador Richard Morningstar was there a while ago.
"We attach great importance to the development of relations with the United States. At the same time, political and business circles in the United States recently, have shown a keen interest in establishing full cooperation with Turkmenistan," Berdimuhammedov said at the meeting of the Cabinet.
Turkmenistan is a key supplier of natural gas in the Caspian region. U.S. Department of State has spoken about its support of Ashgabat in diversifying energy output to world markets, in particular, entering Europe via the Caspian Sea. Recently Vice-Premier Meredov has visited Brussels, where he took part in the meeting of Committee of the European Union-Turkmenistan. The main outcome of the negotiations was the decision by the Turkmen leadership to prepare a legal framework for cooperation with Europe in the field of energy.
As it is known, until recently, the bulk of Turkmen gas was bought by Russia, but deliveries were suspended because of the accident at the main gas pipeline Central Asia-Center. After the restoration of communications, exports are not resumed, as Gazprom has offered to revise the long-term contract for procurement to reduce the volume or value, negotiations are continuing. By early next year, it is scheduled to build a pipeline to China.
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