Page 15 - FSUOGM Week 02 2023

FSUOGM POLICY FSUOGM

Aliyev denies allegations of Azerbaijan

reselling Russian gas

AZERBAIJAN ALIYEV denied allegations that Azerbaijan 1 bcm of gas. This conversation took place at the
is reselling Russian gas to the West during an end of the year, in November, after the country's
Europe has reached interview with CBC Television on January 10. energy balance had already been approved. That
out to Azerbaijan as Several outlets have claimed that Azerbaijan is is, in this case, we had only one month left to
an alternative supplier now importing Russian gas to meet its export make a decision. Instead of the expected 4 bcm,
of gas to Russia, but obligations towards Europe under a new deal. we could get only 1 bcm. But we got out of the sit-
Azerbaijan itself is "In my opinion, this is information manipu- uation. As they say, in every loss there is a good.
supplied with Russian lation, and I have every reason to think so. I must This situation forced us to pay more attention to
gas. say that Mr.Schröder, the former chancellor of production in our country, and we stopped buy-
Germany and former head of one of the Russian ing gas from Russia," he added.
energy companies, started this rumour for the "Now we are talking about buying 1 bcm of
first time. Then this version spread in the press gas from Russia. The contract was closed at the
and, of course, our opponents welcomed it with end of last year, and we have not received even
joy, and tried to accuse us of playing some kind half of that volume in the past period. Why do
of unfair game. This completely defies all logic," we do this? Yes, our consumption is increasing,
Aliyev said. and the population is increasing. Enterprises that
"Even if we look at the volume of our exports did not work at full capacity when there were
in elementary terms, it is clear that this is out insufficient reserves – a methanol plant, urea
of the question," he added. According to him, plant, and petrochemical plants are now work-
when Azerbaijan bought gas from Russia, it was ing at full capacity. If we look at the volume of
a long time ago, and Aliyev was still working in production and export in Azerbaijan alone last
an industrial company. He added that Azerbai- year, we will see that we exported 22 bcm of gas
jan used to buy gas 15 years ago, but even then and, we imported only 200 and 300 mcm, that is,
Russia refused to give more than 1 bcm. 1%. This year we will export 24 bcm of gas and
"It was profitable. At that time, our own gas import the rest of that 1 bcm," he added.
was not enough, and we bought gas in order not He referred to the rumour spreaders as "dilet-
to use fuel oil in the production of electricity, tantes" and "provocateurs".
that is, to get more benefits," he said. "If I'm not "But I think in this case we are facing both.
mistaken, in 2006 or 2007, gas purchases from However, attempts to constantly slander Azer-
Russia were stopped due to a sharp increase in baijan and reduce our role and importance are
prices – practically doubling. At that time we not new issues. I remember that at one time
were told that the price would be twice as high. In they said that Azerbaijan does not have oil, the
itself, this price was high compared to the price Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline will not be built,
in Western European countries, and the sales then they said that Azerbaijan does not have gas,
volume would be reduced four times. We used and now they say these things, let them say. We
to buy 4 bcm of gas, but they told us on behalf of have done our job and we are doing it success-
Gazprom that now they can supply us with only fully," he concluded. ™

Week 02 11•January•2023 www. NEWSBASE .com P15