Azerbaijan president confirms readiness for gas transit through Ukraine

Ukraine and the European Union have asked Azerbaijan to supply natural gas to Europe through Ukraine after the current contract with Russia expires at the end of the year, announced President of  Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, writes Bloomberg .

Negotiations are ongoing with the authorities in Ukraine and the EU, as well as with Russia, and all parties seem to be interested in continuing the supply.

"We will help if we can. I think it’s possible to prolong this deal," the Azerbaijan leader said at a conference on Saturday in the town of Shusha.

Countries such as Austria and Slovakia will have "serious problems" if Russian gas supplies through Ukraine are cut off, as they will have to pay "hundreds and hundreds of millions" more to buy gas from other countries, Aliyev said.

Azerbaijan is trying to be "careful" because earlier it was "falsely accused" of re-exporting Russian gas, added President Aliyev.

Gas production in the country will increase thanks to new projects already operating in the Caspian Sea.

Bloomberg reported in June that European officials are discussing the continuation of gas supplies through Ukraine.

The agreement to replace Russian gas with Azerbaijani gas is "one of the proposals" currently under discussion, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy said at the beginning of July.

In an interview with LIGA.net last week, the Chairman of the Board of Naftogaz of Ukraine Oleksiy Chernyshov confirmed the negotiations regarding the transit of Azerbaijani gas. This was the initiative of the largest state holding of Azerbaijan, SOCAR, but there is no solution yet.

Chernyshov reiterated that Naftogaz will not extend the transit agreement with Gazprom. Negotiations are not underway and are not planned.

In 2019, Gazprom and Naftogaz signed a five-year transit contract, according to which the Ukrainian company is the organizer of gas transportation. Its term expires at the end of 2024 and will not be extended.

On March 4, 2024, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said that Ukraine is ready to provide a gas transit service from Russia after the end of the contract, if the EU countries order it. Above all, this concerns Austria and Slovakia, which import gas from Russia through Ukraine.