Ukraine in Arabic | Iran: We aren’t ready to replace Russian gas supplies
KYIV/Ukraine in Arabic/ Iran would be unable to quickly supply the European Union’s gas demand if Russia decides to reduce its gas sales to Europe for some reason, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said.
“Today we do not have required conditions, when everyone would think that yes, if Russia stops to supply gas, then Iran would be able to do the same. Our production is far from this stage,” Rouhani stressed.
Besides he highlighted that at the moment Iran focuses on internal country’s needs, including the needs in power supplies, as during the wintertime the country “sometimes experiences problems.” Apart from that, Iran’s neighboring countries are also interested in buying gas from Tehran.
"We are lagging in production and think about domestic consumption first," Rouhani told.
"From time to time, we have problems during winter and then, you know, we have many buyers, clients around us... All our neighbors to the east, west and south want to buy gas which we are yet to produce," he said.
Russia is currently Europe's biggest supplier of natural gas, meeting a third of its demand worth $80 billion a year. The EU has imposed sanctions on Moscow over the conflict in Ukraine, increasing the need for gas from elsewhere.
"Conditions today are not such when everybody would think that if Russia stops gas supplies tomorrow then this gas would be supplied by Iran," Rouhani added. "Our production is far from this stage yet."
Iran, which needs to add large pipeline infrastructure, has long lobbied to build a designated pipeline that would connect its huge South Pars gas field with European customers - the so-called Persian Pipeline.
The European Union is highly interested in Iranian massive oil and gas deposits, however Tehran has been reluctant on developing its oil and gas projects with international players until a final settlement with foreign governments over its nuclear program is reached and all Western sanctions earlier imposed against Iran are lifted.
