Azernews.Az

BAKU – Russia will host a summit of the Caspian littoral states to discuss the legal status of the resource-rich basin, but its date and a city that will host it have not been determined yet, a Russian official said Wednesday.

"Only the Russian president can set the summit venue," Alexander Golovin, Russian presidential representative for the Caspian affairs, said after a meeting of the working group developing a convention on the Caspian status, Itar-Tass reported.

Golovin also said the next meeting of the taskforce will be held in Astana.

"Negotiations on the legal status of the Caspian and the implementation of the agreements which the presidents of our countries have reached will be continued at this meeting," he said.

Deputy Foreign Minister Khalaf Khalafov, the Azerbaijani negotiator, said "nothing prevents" the signing of a full-scale framework convention on the Caspian status, RIA Novosti reported.

Khalafov added that all sides "have the will and desire" to speed up work on the agreement.

Azerbaijan, Russia and Kazakhstan signed an agreement in 2001 on dividing the Caspian’s northern area into national sectors, with Azerbaijan and Russia each possessing 19 percent, while the Central Asian state received 29 percent. However, Iran and Turkmenistan did not sign the agreement.

Iran wants all resources shared equally among five states, even though its coast accounts for less than 14 percent.