Hungary May Import Natural Gas From Azerbaijan Starting 2021 - Foreign Minister

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 31st March, 2019) Hungary may start importing natural gas from Azerbaijan starting 2021, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said in a statement.

Szijjarto met with Azerbaijan's Energy Minister Parviz Shahbazov on the sidelines of the Russian Energy Week International Forum in Moscow on Friday. The diplomat said Hungary wanted to join the Southern Gas Corridor project, which aims to build a pipeline that will deliver Azerbaijani gas to Europe through Turkey.

"Hungary has an interest in sharing in Azerbaijan's increased natural gas production from 2021, and in gas shipments destined for Europe. This is extremely important to Hungary because the diversification of gas procurement routes has been on the agenda for a long time, but for various geological and regional reasons this could not be realized so far," the Hungarian Foreign Ministry quoted Szijjarto as saying.

The foreign minister added that last week Hungary reached an agreement with Russian gas giant Gazprom on gas imports from Russia in 2020.

Szijjarto also noted that the tense Russian-Ukrainian relations were severely affecting Central Europe, which relies on Russia for gas, because the two neighboring nations had not yet agreed 2020 gas exports. The foreign minister said that more than half of Hungary's Russian gas imports came through Ukraine.