Gazprom ready to buy Azeri natural gas

The Russian Gazprom company has once again told Azerbaijan that it is ready to buy the entire output of Azeri natural gas at international market prices. This was announced on December 24 by Gazprom representative Sergey Kuprianov. He also highlighted that Gazprom is ready to transport the Azeri gas to Russia and on to the West and has all the necessary infrastructure for doing so.

Gazprom first aired this proposal last summer. Until then it was assumed that the entire Azeri natural gas output would be pumped through the existing Baku-Tbilisi-Erzerum gas pipeline and then on to the West.

On June 3, 2008 Gazprom Chairman Aleksey Miller met President Ilham Aliev of Azerbaijan and agreed to buy Azeri gas at market prices. Until 2007 Russia was providing Azerbaijan with natural gas via the pipeline through Russian Federation member Dagestan. In 2007 Azerbaijan stopped receiving natural gas from Russia and now the possibility of pumping Azeri gas through the existing pipeline in the northern direction is being discussed.

Currently Azerbaijan is self-sufficient in natural gas and need no external supply.