Turkey intends to implement the Nabucco project to supply natural gas from the Caspian region to Europe, bypassing Russia, RIA Novosti quoted Turkish Energy Minister Hilmi Guler as saying.
"We set the aim of completing Nabucco. If necessary, this should be done regardless of where the energy sources are located. Small obstacles in big projects never prevent their realization," he told journalists in Ankara.
The Nabucco project, estimated at 7.3 billion euro, envisages transporting natural gas from the Caspian region to Europe via Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Austria. It will be a continuation of the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline and transport 20-30 billion cubic meters of gas per year.
Construction of the gas pipeline will be launched in 2011 and gas supplies will begin in 2014.
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