Russia Makes Turkmenistan Proposals in Oil & Gas
Russia has asked Turkmenistan to join the OPEC + deal to reduce oil production in order to stabilize the world’s oil market, and to resume joint projects in the gas sector, stated Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak.
"We invited our colleagues to participate in the Forum of Gas Exporting Countries, as well as in the agreement between the OPEC countries and non- OPEC," Novak said, noting that Turkmenistan is ready to be an observer, not formally entering into an agreement, and also to participate in discussion of the situation developing in the hydrocarbon raw materials markets.
According to Novak, although Turkmenistan extracts and sells oil, it does so in small amounts.
Russian President Vladimir Putin officially visited Turkmenistan and held talks with the leader of the state, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov, during which the key issues of bilateral cooperation in the political, trade-economic, scientific-educational and cultural-humanitarian spheres were considered.
Novak said that Russia and Turkmenistan are considering joint projects for the extraction and sale of Turkmen gas.
"Historically, we worked together with Turkmenistan to buy Turkmen gas. We are looking at projects for the extraction and sale of Turkmen gas," the Russian minister said.
According to reserves of "blue fuel," Turkmenistan occupies fourth place in the world after Russia, Iran and Qatar. For a long time, the main buyer of Turkmen gas was Russia, in particular, Gazprom. But after a series of scandals connected with price disagreements, the Russian gas holding stopped buying gas in Turkmenistan.
In April 2003, Russia and Turkmenistan signed an agreement on cooperation in the gas industry for 25 years. As part of the agreement, the parties entered into a long-term contract for the purchase and sale of Turkmen natural gas.
Deliveries were made through the system of transit gas pipelines ‘Central Asia – Center’, passing through the territory of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Russia. In accordance with intergovernmental agreements, Gazprom acted as the operator for the transit of Turkmen gas through those territories.
Throughout the 1990s and most of the 2000s, Turkmenistan sold the bulk of Russia's produced gas, and the remainder was supplied to Iran. Due to the lack of other export infrastructure, Russia's vast pipeline network was the only export outlet for Turkmenistan.
For many years, Gazprom was the only intermediary available to the former president of Turkmenistan, Niyazov, which bought Turkmen gas at low prices and sold it at high prices. In the end, Turkmenistan rebelled. At present, the Turkmen gas market is reoriented to supplying fuel to China, which invested considerable funds in the gas transportation structure of Turkmenistan.
Dimitri Dolaberidze