YEREVAN (TCA) — Armenian Prime Minister Karen Karapetian met with Iran’s and Turkmenistan’s ambassadors in Yerevan on January 9 for talks that apparently focused on possible supplies of Turkmen natural gas to Armenia via Iran, MassisPost.com reported.
The Prime Minister said that the high level of relations with Iran and Turkmenistan allows further deepening the economic ties and launching cooperation in trilateral format.
“We are interested in the development of Armenia-Iran-Turkmenistan trilateral economic cooperation. We have the opportunity to increase the growth of trade turnover between our countries,” the press office of the Armenian Prime Minister said.
“The meeting focused on the possibilities and prospects for the development of trilateral cooperation in the field of energy,” the Armenian government said in a statement. “The interlocutors discussed issues related to supply of energy resources and joint projects.”
Ambassadors Seyed Kazem Sajadi of Iran and Muhammad Niaz Mashalov of Turkmenistan reiterated the willingness of their countries to expand the cooperation with Armenia and discuss future steps in that direction.
Turkmenistan was Armenia’s main supplier of natural gas in the 1990s, until the Armenian government signed a long-term contract with Russia’s Gazprom, which currently supplies more than 80 percent of gas used in Armenia for power generation, heating and other purposes.
The rest of Armenian gas imports come from Iran through a pipeline built in 2008.
Visiting Yerevan last December, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said he and his Armenian counterpart Serzh Sarkisian agreed in principle to increase Iranian gas supplies to Armenia.
Rouhani also announced that his country was ready to serve as a transit route for Armenia’s gas imports from Turkmenistan.
