From: Justin Burke (JBurke@sorosny.org)
Date: Fri Feb 28 2003 - 13:01:54 EST
CASPIAN NEWS AGENCY
CNA all-inclusive newsline
/17:26 28.02.2003/ Azerbaijan, Russia sign agreement on
military-technical cooperation
Baku, February 28, 2003. (CNA). The defense ministers of Russia and
Azerbaijan signed an agreement Thursday on military-technical
cooperation, boosting a relationship that had cooled in the wake of
Baku's friendship with the United States and Moscow's close relationship
with Armenia, Azerbaijan's rival, AP reports.
"This agreement will allow the Russian and Azerbaijani sides to realize
wide-scale military and military-technical cooperation," said Russian
Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov.
He said that it provided for the supply of military equipment and spare
parts to both countries, as well as military training.
Azerbaijani Defense Minister Safar Abiyev expressed satisfaction that
the agreement recognized Azerbaijan's territorial integrity and the
inviolability of its frontiers. However, he accused Russia of illegally
transferring more than US$1 billion worth of armaments to Armenia, and
said the weaponry was in Nagorno-Karabakh, the enclave ethnic Armenian
forces wrested from Azerbaijani control in a six-year war that ended
with a cease-fire in 1994.
"All of it is now concentrated on the occupied Azerbaijani territories
and this weaponry can work at any time and destabilize the situation in
our region," Abiyev said.
"If the occupied territories are not liberated, Azerbaijan will be
obligated to restore its territorial integrity."
Ivanov said that Russian prosecutors had closed an investigation into
the alleged transfer of arms to Armenia "because of the absence of a
crime."
"But these are all historical questions and they bear no relation with
modern realities," he said.
______
/17:24 28.02.2003/ Project to build gas pipeline from the Caspian Sea to
Turkey is launched
Baku, February 28, 2003. (CNA). The international partners working to
build a natural gas pipeline from the Caspian Sea to Turkey gave the
US$3.2 billion project the go-ahead on Thursday.
When complete, the project will pump an estimated 8.4 billion cubic
meters (296.61 billion cubic feet) of gas annually from the Shah Deniz
field through Baku and the Georgian capital Tbilisi to Erzurum in
Turkey.
Construction gets underway next year, and the first gas deliveries are
expected in 2006.
"Another milestone has been achieved," Medjid Kerimov, Azerbaijan's
minister of fuel and energy, said at the official ceremony in Baku,
according to a press statement. "The scale of the project means that
Azerbaijan is now firmly positioned to become a major gas exporter."
Natig Aliev, president of Azerbaijan's state-owned oil company, said the
project will help bring this impoverished region "economic prosperity
and stability."
BP PLC will operate the pipeline. Other participants are Norway's
Statoil, Azerbaijan's state oil company and France's TotalFinaElf.
The project calls for a drilling platform, five underwater wells, two
underwater pipelines, aboveground pipelines, and an onshore processing
terminal. A Russian diplomat this week expressed concern about the
environmental impact of pipelines along the bottom of the Caspian, but
there was no indication that Russian complaints would have any direct
effect on the project.
______
/14:54 28.02.2003/ Statoil named as Shah Deniz operator company
Tbilisi. February 28, 2003. (CNA). Norway's Statoil has been named
commercial operator covering gas sales, contract administration and
business development for Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz gas and condensate
field in the Caspian Sea. The Statoil reports that the company will be
commercial operator for business development and administration of the
South Caucasus Pipeline Company (SCPC).
The SCPC will pipe gas from Baku via Georgia to Turkey in a
690-kilometre line due to begin operating in 2006, which will be laid
alongside the planned Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline.
Statoil and BP each have a quarter share in the gas field and the South
Caucasus Pipeline Company, Civil Georgia writes.
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