Baku, Azerbaijan, Oct.1
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
Berlin sees the Southern Gas Corridor as highly important for a diversified energy supply in Germany and in the European Union, Parliamentary State Secretary at German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, Thomas Bareiss, told Trend.
Azerbaijan will be a key supplier of the gas via the Southern Gas Corridor and therefore plays a key role for making this project a success, he noted.
“For the first time in history, the new Southern Gas Corridor will give the countries in the European Union direct access to gas from the Caspian region. This also means that Azerbaijan’s role as a gas supplier and transit country for Europe will also increase. And Azerbaijan will benefit from having a new sales market,” added Bareiss added.
He went on to add that Azerbaijan is not only Germany’s most important economic partner in the South Caucasus, but also an important partner for its efforts to boost the energy security and is a reliable trading partner.
“The bilateral trade volume in 2018 was just under 2 billion euros. In 2018, Azerbaijan exported more than three million tonnes of crude oil to Germany, becoming our eighth most important supplier. Germany seeks to further expand these relations on the principles of trustful cooperation and the rule of law,” said Bareiss.
He said referring to the German Bundesbank data that the stock of investments owned by German companies in Azerbaijan was 111 million euros in 2017.
“More recent data is not available, yet. By furthering the cooperation between Azerbaijan and Germany, we want to increase these figures for the benefit of both countries,” noted Bareiss.
The Southern Gas Corridor is one of the priority projects for the EU and envisages the transportation of 10 billion cubic meters of Azerbaijani gas from the Caspian region through Georgia and Turkey to Europe.
The launching ceremony of the first stage of the Southern Gas Corridor was held in Baku on May 29, 2018, while opening ceremony of TANAP was held on June 12, 2018 in the Turkish city of Eskisehir.
The gas from the Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field has already gone through the first segment of the Southern Gas Corridor - from the Sangachal terminal to the expanded South Caucasus Pipeline.
Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) and Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) were connected on the Turkish-Greek border.
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