EU Re-opens Talks on $ 11bn Nabucco Pipeline

PRAGUE (RNW) – The European Union opened talks with leaders from the Caspian sea region and beyond to breathe some life into the ambitious Nabucco pipeline project, designed to take non-Russian gas to Europe. The project is intended to reduce Europe’s dependence on Russian resources through cooperation with Caspian, Central Asian and Middle East countries.

Czech deputy prime minister Alexandr Vondra told reporters ahead of the meeting that

“The EU and the countries of the ‘new Silk Road’ are launching a new cooperation which could lead to more diversification of energy resouces and cooperation in the energy sector. We need to bring consuming countries like the EU and supplying countries like Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and other transit countries like Turkey together.”

Bypassing Russia & Ukraine

The project centres on the 3,300 kilometre (2,050 mile), 7.9 billion euro (10.6 billion dollar) Nabucco pipeline between Turkey and Austria, which it is hoped will start pumping gas to Europe by 2014. Its goal is to bypass Russia and Ukraine, whose dispute over gas prices halted supplies to Europe in January, leaving thousands of households without heating in the middle of a severe winter.

In a draft statement, the EU along with Azerbaijan, Egypt, Georgia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan agreed that the EU and Turkey should hammer out a deal “as quickly as possible (and) to sign it by June 2009.”