Turkey cuts gas exports to Greece

Feb 8, 2012, 10:57 GMT

Istanbul - Turkey has cut gas exports to Greece and does not expect to restore them for several days, a spokesman for Greek gas company DEPA told dpa Wednesday.

The spokesman confirmed that supplies were cut late Tuesday, after running at around 60 per cent of the normal volume.

'Turkish gas exporter BOTAS has told us they will try to restore supply in a few days,' he said.

Turkish energy minister Taner Yildiz announced Tuesday that gas imports from both Azerbaijan and Iran had been reduced to one seventh of normal levels due to unrelated problems faced by both suppliers.

Imports from Azerbaijan had been stopped completely due to a problem on a gas production platform in the Caspian Sea, he said, while imports from Iran had been reduced to around 6 million cubic metres a day following an explosion at a compressor station.

'We are supplying Greece with gas when we can,' he said.

A spokesman for BP, which operates Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz gas production field, confirmed to dpa that it expected to restart production Wednesday.

Turkey annually imports up to 6.6 billion cubic metres of gas from Azerbaijan, of which it exports up to 800 million cubic metres a year to Greece. The supply has been interrupted on several occasions this year.

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