With Russia politically weakened by the Ukraine imbroglio and the European Union more intent than ever finally to establish its autonomy in energy policy via Caspian Sea gas, Turkmenistan has opened up again the possibility for exporting its gas under … Continue reading →
The Turkish Stream pipeline is increasingly problematic for Russia. Even though it has recently agreed with Turkey on the route of the pipeline, it does not follow that deliveries will begin in December 2016 as stated by a Gazprom representative. … Continue reading →
A source at Turkmenneftegazstroi is reported as saying the Turkmenistan pipeline from Dauletabad in the southeast to the Caspian Sea coast (“East-West Pipeline” or EWP) for natural gas (see dotted line across south in the map) will be completed in … Continue reading →
Russia continues to play hardball with natural gas for the European Union, trying to get Brussels to sacrifice Ukraine in return for the promise of better relations with Moscow. This geo-economic and power-political jousting is conditioned by the fact that EU sanctions against Russia will begin to expire in three phases between March and July unless there is an EU consensus to keep them in place.
Continue reading →Keynote Speech to the Second Baku Forum of Association of Scholars of International Relations (ASIRS) These days people use the word “unprecedented” a lot. But there is a truly new international situation around the South Caucasus. Both Russia and Turkey … Continue reading →
The president of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR), Rovnag Abdullaev, has announced that the US$8 billion-plus Trans-Anatolian Gas Pipeline may be expanded four-fold from its initially planned volume of 8-16 billion cubic meters per year (bcm/y) to as … Continue reading →
Keynote speech to the Seventh Annual Eurasian Pipelines Colloquium, “Geo-Eco Politics, Eurasian Energy, and (elusive) Transparency,” School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, 16 April 2012. Thank you. I have been asked to make some remarks on the theme … Continue reading →
The debate over Iran and its relations with the international community tends to gloss over how Iran threatens Azerbaijan sovereignty. It has taken on such a character that egregious errors of fact and logic cannot be allowed to stand, especially … Continue reading →
The French energy major Total this weekend announced yet another major natural gas discovery in the Caspian Sea offshore from Azerbaijan. The Absheron block is located to the east of the better-known Shah Deniz field (in which Total has a … Continue reading →
The changing geo-economic environment around the Central Asian and South Caucasus hydrocarbon energy producers is reflected in a public flip-flop by a major European Union official this week. At a news conference in Berlin, European Union Energy Commissioner Gunther Oettinger, … Continue reading →