Turkmenistan: Ashgabat Moves Quickly to Complete Energy Deal with Iran

An Iranian delegation is due in Turkmenistan within days to work out details of a preliminary bilateral agreement covering the development of the Central Asian nation's gas deposits in the Yoloten region.

Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov worked out the framework agreement during a February 13-15 visit to Iran. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. According to a report distributed by the Tehran Times on February 17, Iran's ambassador in Ashgabat, Mohammad Reza Forqani, revealed that Iranian experts will try to hammer out all the terms of cooperation during the upcoming visit to Ashgabat.

"Iran will act as a contractor and the Turkmen side will pay all the expenses," Turkmen state television quoted the chairman of the Iranian Gas Export Company, Reza Kasaeizadeh, as saying.

According to Iran's state-owned ISNA news agency, Iran's oil minister, Gholamhossein Nozari, indicated that Tehran would import an additional 10 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Turkmen gas annually. Iran currently imports about 8 bcm of gas from its northern neighbor. Officially, trade turnover between the two countries stood at just under $3 billion in 2008 and is expected to rise to $5 billion in 2009.

The Yoloten gas field is part of the Southern Yoloten-Osman deposit near the Turkmen-Iranian border. An appraisal by a British firm, Gaffney, Cline & Associates, indicated that the deposit contained at least 4 trillion cubic meters of gas, and perhaps as much as 14 trillion.