Azerbaijan, Baku, Feb.6 / Trend A.Taghiyeva /
If Turkey refuses to import Iranian gas, it will consider the issue of increasing its supply of Azerbaijani gas, department of contract of sale of the Turkish state pipeline company Botas told Trend on Monday.
According to a forecast, six billion cubic metres of gas will be supplied to Turkey from Azerbaijan in 2012.
"If countries cannot come to an agreement on prices, Turkey will consider the option of increasing supplies of Azerbaijani gas," a company spokesperson said.
Earlier Turkey sued Iran at the International Court of Arbitration over short supply of Iranian gas to Turkey.
Turkish minister of energy and natural resources Taner Yildiz said earlier if Iran does not reach an agreement with Turkey on lower gas prices, then Ankara will have to file a second lawsuit against Tehran to dispute the price.
In 1996, Iran and Turkey signed an agreement to supply 10 billion cubic metres of gas to Turkey annually (30 million cubic metres per day).
At present Turkey receives gas from the Shah Deniz Azerbaijani gas condensate field via the South Caucasus pipeline (Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum). According to the contract, Turkey must receive 6.6 billion cubic metres of gas from the first stage of Shah Deniz field development (total reserves are 1.2 trillion cubic metres).
The contract to develop the offshore Shah Deniz field was signed June 4, 1996. Partners in the agreement are: BP (operator) - 25.5 per cent, Statoil - 25.5 per cent, NICO - 10 per cent, Total - 10 per cent, LukAgip - 10 per cent, TPAO - 9 per cent and SOCAR-10 per cent.