Baku, Azerbaijan, June 3
By Maksim Tsurkov - Trend:
SOCAR (State Oil Company of Azerbaijan) and Iraqi National Oil Company are establishing a working group for the implementation of joint projects, Azerbaijani Minister of Energy Natig Aliyev told the media June 3.
"The matter rests in making investments in Iraq," he said. "We intend to choose one of the projects, an oil field there. We will work on it."
He said that Iraqi companies were invited to participate in the implementation of projects in Azerbaijan.
"I am confident that this cooperation will be productive," Aliyev said.
Azerbaijan and Iraq signed a memorandum of understanding which will enable both sides to cooperate in the oil and gas sector and work together in all upstream, midstream downstream projects, Iraqi Oil Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi told Trend.
On the basis of this memorandum, Iraqi and Azerbaijani companies can create joint ventures on the territories of both countries, as well as in third countries, according to Iraqi minister.
Furthermore, Abdul-Mahdi said that Iraq has great potential for joining the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) project.
The TANAP project envisages the transportation of gas of Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz field from the Georgian-Turkish border to the western borders of Turkey. TANAP's initial capacity is expected to reach 16 billion cubic meters of gas per year.
Around six billion cubic meters of this gas will be delivered to Turkey and the rest of the volume to Europe. Turkey will obtain gas in 2018. The gas will be supplied to Europe in early 2020 after the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) is constructed.
BP and the TANAP consortium signed March 13 a shareholder agreement, according to which BP will become one of the shareholders of TANAP. The agreement is one of the main documents for BP's ownership of a stake in the TANAP project.
Following the completion of a legal implementation procedure, TANAP's shareholders list will be as follows: SOCAR - 58 percent, Botas - 30 percent and BP - 12 percent.
Edited by CN
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