Azernews.Az

The United States "warmly welcomes" Tuesday’s signing of Azerbaijan-Turkey agreements on the purchase of Azerbaijani gas and its transit to Europe, US ambassador in Baku Matthew Bryza has said, terming it "one of the most significant steps" in the realization of the Southern Corridor of pipelines.

Bryza told the Baku-based news agency Trend that the agreement underscores the commercial attractiveness of the Southern Corridor, which will deepen the economic and strategic links between Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, and European countries.

"We now look forward to the next round of decisions on pipeline routes and upstream development, which we hope will usher in a new era of energy security for all of our friends throughout the South Caucasus and Europe," Bryza said.

The South Corridor is a priority EU energy project diversifying energy supply routes and sources and increasing security. It includes the Nabucco gas pipeline, Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) and Interconnector Turkey-Greece-Italy (ITGI).

The signing of the long-awaited transit deal was announced on Tuesday by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan at a joint news conference with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in the Turkish city of Izmir. Details on the accord were not available, but Azerbaijan was negotiating to sell Ankara 6 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas per year from the second phase of developing Shahdaniz, Azerbaijan’s largest gas field in the Caspian Sea, which begins in 2017, and to ship 10 bcm to European customers via Turkey.

Turkey and Azerbaijan also signed agreements on the cost and volume of Azerbaijani gas to be supplied to Turkey during Phase 2 of Shahdaniz development.