Baku plans to increase gas supply to Russia

From 2010 Azerbaijan will start supplying natural gas to Russia. This was stated by Azeri President Ilham Aliev. He stressed that although in 2007 Azerbaijan was buying gas from Russia it will become a supplier of gas to Russia from 2010.

Moscow prefers to buy Azeri gas to satisfy the needs of its southern regions and sell its own gas in the West. This project is therefore mutually beneficial and it shows the character of relations between the two countries, stated Aliev, adding that in future the volume of gas supply to Russia will increase.

Aliev stated that cooperation between the two countries in the sphere of energy has quite a long history and has achieved good results. Azeri oil has been transited through the Baku-Novorissisk pipeline for many years and the volume of this transit has increased considerably in 2009.