Turkmenistan, Georgia to cooperate in building Caspian-Black Sea transit corridor
ASHGABAT (TCA) — Turkmenistan’s capital Ashgabat on August 30 hosted a meeting of the Joint Turkmen-Georgian Intergovernmental Commission for economic cooperation, the State News Agency of Turkmenistan reported. On the same day, Turkmenistan's President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov and Georgian Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili held a meeting to discuss bilateral cooperation. At the Commission’s meeting, transport sector was named to be one of the Turkmen-Georgian relations’ strategic vectors. The South Caucasus is part of the Caspian-Black Sea transport-transit corridor, the use of which enables to ensure broad interregional integration with the countries of Europe and the Middle East. The sides noted the importance of creating the Afghanistan-Turkmenistan-Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey transit corridor. At the meeting between Turkmenistan's President and Georgian Prime Minister, it was said that Georgia supports Turkmenistan's initiatives to ensure a reliable and stable transit of energy and create international transport and communication infrastructure, Turkmenistan's state television reported. The sides also stressed that the geographically favorable location and common interests create opportunities for creating transit corridors involving the transportation capacities of the Caspian and Black Sea regions. These transport corridors will create wider opportunities for interregional integration, access to world markets and intensification of trade and economic ties in the Eurasian area. Turkmenistan has long been working on organizing natural gas deliveries from the Caspian Sea region to Europe, which has been supported by Turkey and the European Union, Sputnik news agency reported. Turkmenistan, alongside Azerbaijan, stands in favor of building a trans-Caspian subsea pipeline with the consent of the states whose territories the new pipeline will cross, including Georgia.
