ISTANBUL (Armenpress) — An intergovernmental agreement on the Turkish Stream pipeline has been signed in Istanbul on October 11, in the presence of both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who held talks earlier, RT reported.
“You now witnessed the signing of the intergovernmental agreement on the construction of the Turkish Stream. As part of this project and the broadening of our cooperation, we agreed on a mechanism by which to provide a discount on gas [for Turkey],” Putin said at the press conference following the signing of the agreement. “This way we are moving towards realizing the plans of the Turkish President to create a major energy hub in the country,” he added.
According to Russia’s Energy Minister Aleksandr Novak, Gazprom and Turkish energy giant Botas have already been tasked with working out the amount of the discount. “Right now, by those signatures, we make a decision to intensify works on the construction of the Turkish Stream. Another important issue was [Turkey’s first ever] Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant. Here we reached an agreement to increase the construction pace even more. I’m sure that we’ll be able to catch up on the time that was lost recently,” Erdogan said.
Earlier on Monday, October 10, Gazprom CEO Alexey Miller said that the Turkish Stream project agreement envisioned the construction of two pipeline branches, each with a capacity of 15.75 billion cubic meters (bcm). The first branch will supply gas directly to Turkey, while the second is to be used to deliver gas to European countries through Turkey, he explained. “The intergovernmental agreement would also define the deadline by which the two maritime threads are to be built. It’s December 2019,” Miller said.
