Azernews.Az

BAKU – Turkmen President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov said Thursday that the issues between Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan on the legal status of the Caspian Sea pose no obstacles to relations between the two countries.

Berdymukhamedov told a press conference after a meeting of Turkic countries’ leaders in Istanbul Thursday that there are indeed some differences, "but we will not let them reflect upon our relations".

"Turkmenistan has no intention to disrupt its fraternal relations with Azerbaijan," he said.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev expressed the same position.

"The issue of the Caspian’s division into national sectors is currently not the first, but the last point on the agenda of the two countries," President Aliyev said.

Azerbaijan faces a long-standing dispute with Turkmenistan over the Kapaz (Sardar) field in the Caspian Sea, which was discovered by Azerbaijani oilworkers and holds an estimated 150 million barrels of oil. During the Soviet times, the field was considered "intermediate" due to its being located on the medium line between Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan. A major dispute over the field emerged between the two countries in the 1990s. Turkmenistan claims possession of Kapaz, while Azerbaijan has offered to jointly tap the deposit.

A long road is also ahead in agreeing the Caspian status issue with another coastal state – Iran. Tehran supports equal division of the basin, saying each littoral state is to receive 20 percent of the seabed. Also, Iran claims rights to the Alov field in the Caspian.

The coastal nations have been divided for many years on the status of the Caspian, which is a source of huge hydrocarbon reserves. Azerbaijan has signed agreements on dividing the Caspian into national sectors with Russia and Kazakhstan, with Azerbaijan and Russia each possessing 19%, while the Central Asian state received 29%.