Putin and Erdogan voiced support for the construction of a gas pipeline from Russian Federation to Turkey, called Turkish Stream, a project that was suspended amid tensions between the two countries.
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Back in November, Turkey announced it had cancelled a deal with the China Precision Machinery Import-Export Corporation (CPMIEC), saying that the Chinese company refused to meet Turkish demands including technology transfer.
Speaking at a joint press conference with Putin, Erdogan said: “I firmly believe the normalization process between Turkey and Russian Federation will continue swiftly”.
Putin had first suggested the Turkish Stream project to carry gas beneath the Black Sea into Turkey in 2014, when a pipeline project to Bulgaria fell through amid European Union countries’ opposition. A recent report from Turkey’s Electricity Producers’ Association shows that the annual average of fees paid by Turkey for a thousand cubic meters of natural gas was US$432 for gas bought from Iran, US$412 for Russian gas, and US$282 for Azeri gas.
Pipeline would allow Russian natural gas to be delivered directly to Turkey via the Russian Black Sea coast and on to Greece. They should both be built by 2019, he said.
The agreement relaunching the project was signed in the presence of both countries’ presidents in Istanbul.
The leaders agreed to “speed up the work” on the gas pipeline and move forward with plans to construct Russian Federation based energy hub, the Akkuya Nuclear Power Plant. “The arrival of these Turkish products on the Russian market will expectedly slash prices in Russia”, said Russian President Vladimir Putin.
According to the Russian leader, Moscow and Ankara also agreed to intensify military contacts. The Russian military is present in Syria as an ally of dictator Bashar al-Assad, whom Erdogan has previously referred to as “a more advanced terrorist than the Islamic State”. During their August 9 meeting in Moscow, the two leaders pledged to try and reach the goal of $100 billion in trade volume. The World Energy Congress stood by as the gas pipeline agreement was signed. The two leaders have further agreed to hold a joint economic commission meeting in the coming months, before they co-chair a high-level cooperation meeting in the first months of 2017. They made no mention of their differences on the Syria conflict or of any breakthrough.
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“We have a common stance [with Turkey] regarding what must be done to deliver humanitarian aid to Aleppo”.
