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Military-Political Confrontation.
Source: Nezavisimoe Voennoe Obozrenie, May 18, 2007
Agency WPS
The Russian Oil and Gas Report (Russia) 23/5/2007
All the same, there is good reason to call the Caspian the second
Persian Gulf. Oil production volumes here are comparable to the
combined output of Iraq and Kuwait, but far smaller than the combined
output of OPEC. Caspian production levels are expected to reach 4
million barrels a day by 2015. OPEC produced 45 million barrels a
day in 2006.
For the Caspian region countries, the local oil and gas reserves
are strategic riches; for Moscow, they are of interest only at the
strategic level so far. The main consumers of Russian oil and gas are
in Europe, and as yet there are no Caspian hydrocarbons mixed in with
the resources exported to Europe from Eastern Siberia and Russia's
Arctic regions. Hence our efforts to build the Baltic Pipeline System
and expand deliveries in the south - to Turkey and via Bulgaria and
Greece. But the Caspian Shore Pipeline construction agreement is
already inspiring hope that the Kremlin will pay more attention to
the Caspian.
Russia could not only maintain its positions here, but even enhance
them. The Kremlin's strategic interest in developing new fields
coincides with national interests in developing stable, friendly
relations with states in the South Caucasus (Azerbaijan, Armenia,
Georgia) and Central Asia (Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan), as well
as Iran.
At the end of the 20th Century, the Caspian map changed from two
states - the USSR and Iran - to five independent countries: Russia,
Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, and Iran. This confronted them
all with the problem of defining the status of the lake-sea. Until
the Soviet Union's disintegration, the legal regimen here was based
on two treaties between the USSR and Iran (the RSFSR-Persia treaty of
1921 and the USSR-Iran Trade and Navigation treaty of 1940). These
treaties defined the Caspian as off limits to the vessels of other
states. Negotiations aimed at changing this regimen began in the 1990s,
but they are still at an impasse.
Overall, most pipeline systems being built from the Caspian either
bypass Russia or run south outside Russia. So it is no coincidence
that the agreement reached by Russia, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and
Uzbekistan - on building a Caspian shore pipeline system leading to
Europe via Russia - has caused such a furor abroad. Efforts to cut
off Russia from the Caspian Sea's hydrocarbon riches have failed. And
many do not like this at all.