Articles

Turkey’s Energy Policy - Too Often a Year too Late

In February 2008, President Abdullah Gul reached out to Moscow, suggesting that Russia should join in the construction of the Samsun-Ceyhan oil pipeline designed to divert oil traffic from the congested Bosphorus Straits. He also supported the extension of the Blue Stream natural gas pipeline linking Russia and Turkey under the Black Sea.

His remarks came a week after Foreign Minister Ali Babacan had said in Moscow that Turkey was ‘open to’ using “Russian” gas at certain stages in the Nabucco project, the plan backed by Turkey, the US and EU to carry gas through Turkey and SE Europe to Austria.

However, both invitations appear to come a year too late. Indeed, far from cooperating in Turkey’s vision of its becoming an energy bridge linking East and West, Russia is working to eliminate Turkey from a number of its future projects.

Where oil is concerned, in May 2007, President Putin threw his weight behind the Burgas-Alexandropolis oil line which connects Bulgaria to the northern Aegean. And since June 2007, Gazprom has been working with ENI of Italy on South Stream, a gas pipeline running under the Black Sea from southern Russia to Bulgaria and South East Europe.

Both these projects now have far more momentum than Nabucco which is suffering from what Eurasia Daily Monitor has termed a ‘cascade of defections’.