Energy Minister says Georgia will get electricity - not gas - from Gazprom
By Tea Mariamidze
Wednesday, October 14
“Our government - as well as previous governments - cooperated with Gazprom and there were no problems about this,” stated the Energy Minister, Kakha Kaladze, concerning ongoing talks with Gazprom, the largest natural gas provider company of Russia.
It should be noted that several days ago, the Minister said that the Georgian side held the meeting with Gazprom's CEO, Alexei Miller, in Brussels and discussed the possibility of increasing gas shipments through the North-South pipeline through which Russia supplies gas to Armenia.
This issue became the subject of criticism by the opposition side, who said that holding negotiations with Gazprom means dealing with the Kremlin.
However, Georgia’s Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development Dimitri Kumsishvili said that the meetings with Gazprom representatives are solely technical.
The Prime Minister, Irakli Garibashvili, also commented on the issue, saying that Russian gas will not replace gas supplies from Azerbaijan, which is the main gas provider in Georgia.
“We are not going to have talks about the replacement of Azerbaijani gas in Georgia; this is absurd and I want to ask irresponsible politicians not to mislead people,” PM said after meeting with the President of Azerbaijan in Baku, Ilham Aliyev.
Kaladze also rejected the request of opposition, who asked him to answer questions about the issue in Parliament and for further questions invited them in the Ministry of Energy.
“When the Georgian-Russian war was ongoing in 2008, we were receiving electricity and gas from Russia and even then there was no problem about it. We have very friendly relations with Russia and let’s not politicize this issue,” he stated.
Kaladze confirmed the PM’s statement that Azerbaijani gas will not be replaced by Russian supplies.
“We do not have only one gas supplier. We receive natural gas from Azerbaijan, and Russia too. The future will show what will be in this direction; the countries which were unacceptable in the future, now have become acceptable,” said Kaladze.
