Kazakhstan, Astana, July 1 / Trend , K.Konyrova/
It is impossible to construct an oil pipeline via Iran bypassing Russia in coming years, one of oil workers at the JSC KazMunayGaz National Company believes.
"At present it is not real to construct an oil pipeline from Central Asia via Iran under the global crisis conditions. There are two reasons for this," an employee of the KazMunayGaz who asked to remain anonymous told Trend correspondent in Astana.
The first reason is the fact that the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline has been already built from Central Asia, particularly from the Caspian region which transports the Kazakh oil with tankers via the Caspian Sea from the Aktau port to Baku where an entrance flange of the pipeline is.
"The BTC exists and has proved its consistency, and this pipeline delivers the Kazakh oil to world markets albeit small amounts. But big amounts is the matter of the time," he said.
The Caspian Transport System will be built to increase amounts of the Kazakh oil export via the BTC soon, he said.
"But the oil pipeline via Iran still has to be built. The second reason of unreality of the pipeline from Central Asia via Iran is the fact that only China has enough funds to finance such project at the moment under the crisis conditions," the expert believes.
Last week, Senior Research Fellow of the Russian-Eurasian Program of the Russian-Eurasian program of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington Martha Olcott said that the Central Asian countries should pay attention to possibility of constructing oil pipelines via Iran bypassing Russia.
"I have heard a lot of speeches of those who make decisions in the U.S. and the EU how to build alternative pipelines to Europe not via Russia. But we have never heard a serious consideration of opportunity to include Iran in the system," Olcott said during the NATO Parliamentary Assembly Rose Roth seminars on June 26.