By Azernews

By Nigar Abbasova

Russia and Turkey, the two strategic partners continue to express support for construction of the Turkish Stream pipeline, an energy project that was suspended amid tensions between the two countries.

The sides recently signed an inter-governmental agreement on realizing the construction of the pipeline to pump Russian gas under Turkish waters in the Black Sea towards Europe.

Energy Minister Berat Albayrak and his Russian counterpart Alexander Novak signed the agreement following a meeting between the heads of the two countries, which became the second Putin-Erdogan face-to-face meeting since St. Petersburg meeting and served as an additional signal that the project could be brought into force.  

Meanwhile, gas price, one of the main obstacles that a project faced before deterioration of ties between the two countries, remains in the spotlight.

The Russian president said the two countries had also reached a consensus on a discount in natural gas prices, as part of the deal. Gazprom and Turkish energy giant Botas have already been tasked with working out the amount of the discount.  

Head of Gazprom Alexey Millier talking to Russia 24 said that the discount for the Turkish Botas may be linked with the volumes of supplies of Russian gas to the Turkish market, while majority of experts polled by Kommersant newspaper said that the matter may be a supply of an additional 2 billion cubic meters of gas per year by the trans-Baltic gas pipeline.

 Turkey, which is considered to be the second biggest consumer of Russian gas after Germany, imports gas from Russia via two pipelines - the Blue Stream, which passes under the eastern Black Sea, and the Western Line through the Balkans. The current annual level of Gazprom supplies for Turkey by means of the trans-Baltic gas pipeline stands at 2 bcm for Botas, while some 10 billion bcm accounts for separate importers.

Gazprom and Botas will have legal proceedings in the Geneva Court of Arbitration, should the sides face controversies in the implementation of the agreement.  

The estimated total cost of Turkish Stream is €11.4 billion ($12.7 billion).