EURASIA INSIGHT
Diana Petriashvili
1/26/06
Four days after explosions cut off natural gas and electricity supplies from neighboring Russia, Georgia finds itself gripped by a severe energy crisis. The subsequent failure of a high-voltage power line has plunged Tbilisi and most of the eastern part of the country into blackout conditions. Back-up gas supplies from Azerbaijan have slumped, putting additional pressure on the capital and energy-starved regions.
In response to the deepening crisis, President Mikheil Saakashvili cut short his visit to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on January 26 to return to Tbilisi. According to the Georgia’s Ministry of Fuel and Energy, power is now being delivered only to "strategically important units," such as hospitals. Repair work on the Imereti power line, which supplies eastern Georgia with electricity, and which was damaged by heavy wind, will take at least two days, according to Valeri Pantsulia, a spokesperson for Tbilisi’s power distribution company. Pantsulia stated that Georgia is expected to receive an additional 50-100 megawatts of power from Azerbaijan and Armenia to make up for the deficit. The fresh supplies will first go to areas with no gas, he said, speaking on Rustavi-2 television.
Meanwhile, gas supplies from Azerbaijan, imported to make up for the shortage when a January 22 explosion severed Georgia’s gas supplies from Russia, have decreased to 2 million cubic meters (mcm) per day. The country’s usual supply is around 7 mcm per day. All gas supplies to the regions have since been cut, and only 40 percent of Tbilisi customers still have gas for heating.
Initially the Russian energy giant Gazprom gave assurances that the main and reserve pipelines damaged in the blast would be quickly repaired. But company officials now say that the recent discovery of additional damage to the Mozdok-Tbilisi pipeline could prolong the repair timetable. The Russian news agency ITAR-TASS, quoting an anonymous Gazprom repair specialist, reported January 26 that the company would not now estimate how long repairs will take.
According to Saakashvili, Gazprom is not allowing Georgian specialists to assist in repair work. "As regards the Russian side, we were told [the pipeline] would be repaired yesterday. Now we are being told it may take some time to fix," he said in a televised January 25 interview. "We have proposed and are proposing that Russia let our specialists help repair the gas pipeline in a timely manner."
In an interview with EurasiaNet, Deputy Fuel and Energy Minister Alexander Khetaguri stated that damage to a gas compressor station on the Russian side of the Russia-Azerbaijan border caused supplies to Georgia to fall. Reduced supplies from the Russian gas pipeline meant that Azerbaijan had to rely increasingly on its own gas to meet domestic demand. The Russian prosecutor-general’s office has since reclassified the pipeline explosions as an act of terrorism, ITAR-TASS reported January 26.
As the situation worsens, Georgian government officials are increasingly focusing their frustrations on Russia. At a January 26 news briefing, Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Noghaideli described the crisis as an "energy blockade."
"We see that the restoration of the pipelines takes [the Russian side] longer [than was expected]," Noghaideli said at the news briefing. "We have serious questions for Gazprom . . . as the information it provides is very contradictory."
The Georgian prime minister went on to assail Gazprom for making a specious claim that the company had increased gas supplies to Azerbaijan, supposedly enabling Baku to increase shipments to Georgia. In a January 24 statement, Azerbaijan’s Industry and Energy Ministry confirmed that Azerbaijan is supplying Georgia with its own gas, the Azerbaijani Turan news agency reported. No gas transit agreements exist with Gazprom, or the company’s export branch, GazExport, the statement the Azerbaijani statement added. The ministry stressed that supplies would not fall below 2 mcm meters per day.
"Azerbaijan receives from Russia as much gas as is enough only for Azerbaijan [without further transit to Georgia]," Noghaideli said. "Gazprom should either stop making statements like that or should increase the gas supply to Azerbaijan."
Georgia has also turned to Iran to make up for the deficit. Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki reportedly offered to supply Georgia with an undefined quantity of gas "until the crisis is eliminated," a Georgian Foreign Affairs Ministry news release read. The gas will reach Georgia via the Qaradeg-Tbilisi pipeline, which runs through Azerbaijan, Kavkas-Press reported.
Fuel and Energy Minister Nika Gelauri departed for Baku, the Azerbaijani capital, on January 25 to discuss the delivery, and, as Gelauri told reporters, chances for receiving additional gas from Azerbaijan.
Speaking during a televised January 25 cabinet meeting, Saakashvili urged ministers to "use every opportunity to make sure that no one ever thinks about doing this again to us. . . These people must know that Georgia will not fall apart. They could see it for themselves during the past few days and they should also know that this will not go unnoticed because we are not a distant island no one cares about."
Earlier government charges that Russia organized the blasts in a bid to put pressure on Georgia to sell Gazprom its main gas pipeline has been met with skepticism by some local analysts. "It is unlikely for Russia to resort to such direct, aggressive means as this," said Sandro Tvalchrelidze, an independent local analyst.
Meanwhile, as Georgians scrambled to find alternative heating sources, the government warned that the financial police would prosecute any fuel importer found to have increased prices. "We should all stand together in this time of hardship," the online news site Civil.Ge reported presidential administration chief Giorgi Arveladze as saying.
So far, the government’s response to the crisis appears to have met with a mixed response among Tbilisi residents. While some largely approved of the steps taken, others said that they were ready to take to the streets soon if the government does not take steps to ease the country’s perennial gas and electricity woes.
"It is only normal to have gas and electricity in your houses. And it is the government’s problem if they cannot provide us with it," commented 35-year-old homemaker Maia Lobzhanidze.
One pensioner, however, urged caution. "It is impossible to expect the government to change everything as soon as everybody wants," said David Kvaratskelia, a refugee from the breakaway region of Abkhazia. Georgia’s ongoing energy problems, he added, are "an even more difficult task for this government" than resolution of the conflict with Abkhaz separatists.
Editor’s Note: Diana Petriashvili is a freelance writer based in Tbilisi.
