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Nabucco intergovernmental agreement to be signed in Ankara today

13 July 2009 08:35 (UTC +04:00)

APA correspondent reports from Ankara, senior officials from the transit countries, Hungary, Romania, Austria, Bulgaria, Germany, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Russia, Turkmenistan, Iraq, Syria, Egypt and Qatar, as well as European Bank of Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), European Investment Bank (AIB), European Commission, USA and Nabucco consortium will attend the ceremony. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Chairman of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso,
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, Romanian Prime Minister Emil Boc, Austrian Prime Minister Werner Faymann, Bulgarian Prime MinisterÄ± Sergei Stanishev, Hungarian Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai and Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri El-Maliki, EU Presidency envoy Mikael Eriksson, Egyptian oil minister Amin Sameh Samir Fahmy, Syrian minister of oil and mineral resources Sufian Al-Allao, EBRD Director Riccardo Puliti, AIB Director Thomas Barret, chairman of the Nabucco Coordination Committee Werner Auli, US Special Envoy for Eurasian Energy Richard Morningstar, US Senate Foreign Relations Committee Republicansâ€™ leader Senator Richard Lugar, EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and representatives of the project party companies will join the event. Azerbaijan will be represented at the summit by Minister of Industry and Energy Natig Aliyev.

Transit issues, acceleration of project work, financial and supply issues, as well as signing of agreement with supplier country and companies will be focused at the summit. According to the summit program, at first participants will hear the speeches and then following the signing ceremony they will hold a press conference.

The Nabucco pipeline is a planned natural gas pipeline that will transport the Caspian natural gas from Turkey to Austria, via Bulgaria, Romania, and Hungary. OMV of Austria, MOL of Hungary, Bulgargaz of Bulgaria, Transgaz of Romania, RWE of Germany and BOTAÅž of Turkey joined Nabucco Gas Pipeline International GmbH consortium. Total investment coast of the project was increased recently from 4.6 billion euro to 7.9 billion euro (12.3 billion USD).

The name Nabucco comes from the same famous opera of Giuseppe Verdi dedicated to Babylon king. The pipeline will have total length of 3,300 kilometers. First part of natural gas is planned to be pumped in 2014.