Azerbaijan, Baku, May 29 / Trend, S.Aliyev /
The U.S. was the key player in implementation of projects in Azerbaijan related to opening the Caspian Sea to foreign investors, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev said. He made this statement at the opening of the Azerbaijan-U.S. Convention "Vision for the Future", which is underway in Baku.
"Another area of our cooperation of course is energy security, and we work with United States on these issues very actively since 1994. The U.S. was the key player in implementation of our projects related to opening the Caspian Sea to foreign investors. Azerbaijan was the first country which did that. We need extra routes, transportation routes. And I can tell you, as a person who has been since 1994-2003 directly involved in these issues, that without strong political support from the US and the U.S. Administration in the 1990's, we would not have been able to achieve this success," President Aliyev said.
He stressed that Azerbaijan had a very strong support.
According to President Aliyev, Azerbaijan created very preferable investment climate, and legal protection for its investments. It was managed to create a very positive business atmosphere in Azerbaijan, he added.
"With the strong support from the U.S. Administration, a strategic pipeline connecting Caspian Sea and the Mediterranean - the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan was constructed. The construction of this pipeline was not only the means for Azerbaijan and its partners to transport hydrocarbons. That was actually a new geographical connection, it was a new corridor. And at that time we probably were not able to foresee all the ultimate benefits of this pipeline, but now we see that opening this corridor actually changed the energy map of our continent," President Aliyev underscored.
It allowed Azerbaijan to export as much as it produces, and it allowed Azerbaijan to become a transit country, he said.
"Today, this strategic pipeline is used by our neighbours on the eastern shore of the Caspian, and it allowed us in the future to invest in gas infrastructure, and to use this corridor for strengthening regional cooperation and creation of better conditions for business environment," President Aliyev emphasized.
Today, when Azerbaijan has implemented major strategic energy projects, related to upstream and downstream transportation, the country is working very closely with its European partners on Southern Gas Corridor. Azerbaijan is the initiator of Southern Gas Corridor, Azerbaijan is a country which is recognized by the European Union as main supplier, President Aliyev said.
According to him, two years ago, a memorandum of strategic cooperation was signed in energy sector, and now the parties are on the eve of very serious decisions with respect to the construction of the Southern Gas Corridor.
"This project will allow us to export huge gas reserves of Azerbaijan to European markets, and to provide economic cooperation, economic security for Europe. At the same time it will allow us to increase substantially our export potential. I think we found a very good balance between producers, transitors and consumers. We work closely on this trilateral format," President Aliyev underscored.
He said though none of this gas is going to reach the U.S. territory, the Washington is strongly supporting this strategic project, because it really is the project of the future, the project of economic diversification, energy diversification, regional cooperation, cooperation between Azerbaijan and Europe.
"It will help to diversify our export, and it will help Europe to diversify the supply sources. Because the main diversification is not the diversification of routes, it is the diversification of new sources. And this source is Azerbaijan," President Aliyev underscored.
According to President Aliyev, in the coming years, the US-Azerbaijan relationship in this particular area will be as important as it was in the mid 1990's, when we were just implementing the first stage of the Southern Gas Corridor.
"But, having in mind the strategic importance of this project, we in Azerbaijan domestically concentrate more on diversification of our economy, reduction of dependence on energy sector, and be able to create sustainable development for our country," he underlined.
According to Aliyev, sooner or later oil and gas will come to an end. "In our case it may happen in 100 years or so, but nevertheless, we should diversify our economy, we should divert this "black gold" into human capital, and we already started to do that," he added.