OREANDA-NEWS. May 07, 2010. The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) will not realize short-term contract with NIGEC for gas delivery to Iran.

SOCAR president Rovnag Abdullayev says that the necessity in short-term supplies disappeared as winter season finished.

“Currently we continue swap supplies to Iran to provide gas supplies for Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. If Iran needs short-term supplies, we are ready to conduct them, but today such a need is lacking. The Iranian party set no claims to us on the occasion of non-implementation of the contract as it understands that infrastructure for these ends was not ready,” the SOCAR president said.

Before 1st April SOCAR should have exported 110 million cu m of gas to Iran.

“Within the preparation for long-term contract we expect that in autumn export infrastructure will improve at the expense of installation of new compressors in Astara gas compressing station and we will launch supplies,” he said.

The log-term contract has not been signed.