Iran, Turkey agree on European gas purchase

Iran, which has the world's largest natural gas reserves after Russia, has been considering Ukraine and Turkey as two possible routes for transferring natural gas to Europe. In July 2005 it announced a preliminary agreement with Ukraine to use its pipelines.

According to a statement from the Iranian Oil Ministry web site, Hamaneh said: "We agreed to increase Iran's pipeline capacity by combining Turkey's pipeline and exporting natural gas to Europe together."

Apart from using the five billion cubic meters per day of vacant capacity in Turkey's pipelines, Hamaneh referred to the proposed Nabucco pipeline as the second way to transfer gas through Turkey.

"The Nabucco pipeline has a capacity of 90 million cubic meters [per day] and 30 to 50 percent of its capacity will be allocated to Iran [for its gas exports]," Hamaneh said.

He said the two neighboring countries could not agree on building a new pipeline to take Iran's gas to Europe's consumers.

/www.zaman.com/