“We are currently in talks with Turkey to win the right for gas transit via this country [to Europe],” Javad Owji, who is also managing director of National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC), said on Friday.
Iran, which sits atop the the world's second-largest natural gas reserves after Russia, is Turkey's second-biggest supplier after Moscow.
Owji also said Iran would start pumping natural gas to neighboring Iraq in summer.
“Gas exports to this country will start with seven million cubic meters (mcm) a day and will gradually rise to 25 mcm a day,” the official stated.
He went on to say that Iran will export gas to Iraq through two pipelines, one of which supplies gas to Iraq’s Al-Baghdad and Al-Mansouriyah power plants with the other one delivering gas to the Iraqi port city of Basra.
Iran is trying to boost its gas production by attracting foreign and domestic investments, especially in South Pars Gas Field.
South Pars covers an area of 9,700 square kilometers, 3,700 square kilometers of which is in the Iranian territorial waters in the Persian Gulf. The remaining 6,000 square kilometers, i.e., the North Dome, is situated in Qatar's territorial waters.
