Prague to host Nabucco summit May 8

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Czech EU presidency is to invite five leaders to a summit promoting the non-Russian Nabucco gas pipeline project on May 8. But a Bulgarian event pushing the pro-Russian South Stream pipeline could be a damp squib.

The presidents or prime ministers of Turkey, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Georgia will this week be asked to join an EU "troika" in Prague on 8 May to cultivate closer relations.



The EU trio will comprise acting Czech PM Mirek Topolanek, European Commission head Jose Manuel Barroso and the EU's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana.

Iraq, Egypt and Uzbekistan will be asked to participate at a lower diplomatic level as observers. An observer status invitation is also being mooted for Russia.

Christened the "Southern Corridor" energy summit, the meeting will focus on the future of Nabucco - a 2,000 km-long pipeline to ship gas from Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan to the EU via Turkey from 2014.



Gas from Iraq, Egypt, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Iran may at a later date be hooked up to Nabucco, which is designed to break Russia's monopoly on Caspian zone gas exports to the EU.

While Russia was trying to get wording into the April 24 Sofia summit declaration describing the South Stream pipeline as an EU "priority" project, but that commission negotiators have not agreed.



South Stream is designed to bring Russian gas under the Black Sea via Bulgaria to Italy and Austria. The 1,100 km-long pipeline is to start work in 2015, with some analysts seeing it as a rival to the monopoly-busting Nabucco pipe.