Posted on 08/09/2016 9:14:11 PM PDT by amorphous
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says the Turkish Stream pipeline is going ahead and will be implemented swiftly. The announcement came after Tuesday's meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg.
The Turkish Stream project was parked late last year due to the dispute between Moscow and Ankara after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane in Syria. However, with a thaw in relations the project is expected to be given another life.
The pipeline was announced by President Putin in December 2014 during a visit to Turkey. The project was to replace the abandoned South Stream pipeline through Bulgaria.
The Turkish Stream pipeline is intended to deliver gas from the Russian Black Sea coast to Turkey and on to Greece.
Initially, Russia’s Gazprom wanted to deliver 63 billion cubic meters of gas per year. Later the capacity was cut to 32 billion cubic meters. Turkey would take about 14 billion cubic meters, with the rest going to Europe.
The two sides also decided to continue with Turkey’s first nuclear power plant at Akkuyu. The agreement to build four 1,200 MW reactors at a total project cost of $20 billion was signed in May 2010. Before relations between the countries deteriorated, the first reactor was planned to be commissioned in 2022.
President Putin also said Russia intends to resume charter flights to Turkey, as Ankara has provided security guarantees for Russian tourists.
"We have considered the possibility of the resumption of charter flights. It’s a mere formality and time," said Putin.
The Russian President added that the number of Russian tourists visiting Turkey will soon return to pre-crisis levels, and that the sale of tour packages to Turkey resumed in June. On Tuesday, it was reported the number of Russian tourists visiting Antalya has plummeted 97 percent this year.
In February, Russia's Ambassador to Turkey Andrey Karlov said Turkish exports to Russia fell by two-thirds soon after the jet incident. In November 2015, a Russian pilot died when his plane was shot down over Syria by a Turkish fighter.
Following the incident, Moscow introduced a package of economic measures against Ankara – a visa regime, travel ban, as well as an embargo on agricultural products and on hiring Turkish nationals. All major projects were also frozen.
Good. Let the Russians blackmail a non-Christian country for a change.
“The Russian President added that the number of Russian tourists visiting Turkey will soon return to pre-crisis levels, and that the sale of tour packages to Turkey resumed in June.”
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I have my doubts about that. Risk to tourists in Erdogan’s Turkey will continue to increase. Erdogan is an Islamist. That tiger will never change stripes.
Interesting Idea D.M....
What makes the Greeks look even more foolish is if they need a source on Natural Gas it is right off their coast and the owners are the Israeli's. They are not up to speed yet with their off shore finds, however I see this as Putin trying to snag Greece as customer before the Israeli's do.
How thuggish of him, and how stoopid of the Greeks, I'd rather do business with Israel than with Putin...
And the real reason the coup was attempted comes out.
Vlad wins again.
Also Russians are much poorer than they used to be now that the oil prices dropped. Their average salary is little over $100 a week. Poor people don’t travel and aren’t very profitable tourists.
Agree.
But they HAD to take into account ALL possibilities during planning, no?
Well, no pun, seems they also overlooked the world wide glut of natural gas. Listened to a conference call yesterday from a company drilling along the west coast of africa, they are estimating they are developing a50 trillion CF dome of gas that could go to 150 trillion CF. It will be converted to LNG when functioning in a year or two. Africa a bit closer to Europe than is the coast of Texas/Louisiana and I suspect with less eco restrictions.
Yes it does! Some Prophecy experts point to Psalm 83 as a prerequisite for the Ezekiel 38 war since Lebanon, Syria, and a few other immediate neighbors are not mentioned in Ezekiel 38.
Could it be that they are already destroyed like Isaiah 17:1 says?
It’s inevitable that they’ll get suckered into it.
There are European countries that will buy US or Norwegian LNG at higer price just to keep the terminals alive. It does make sense as the minute that Russia is the sole supplier it increases the price.
I am on my phone and can’t make links, but if you look it up you’ll see that once Lithuania (or maybe Latvia) built a LNG terminal then suddenly Russia decided it is a good idea to offer them cheaper price.
Chain of events:
Russia and Turkey have an agreement to supply (put a strangle hold on) the EU with a natural gas pipeline.
Turkish airforce shoots dowm a Russian plane. ISIS rebels (US backed) capture and kills pilot. This strains relations and the pipeline deal is called off.
Turkey gets attacked by ISIS (US backed??) at Ankara airport.
Turkey the has a coup attempt but it is thwarted. Reports of Turkish airforce participation. Incirlik AB isolated, Commander is arrested.
Turkey claims coup is US/CIA backed and reports Russia provided them Intel prior to coup attempt.
Turkey and Russia announce normalization of relations.
Likely BS, but clears the record.
Might not be BS. Russia knew about the use of chemical weapons in Syria. They knew the US was going to use it as a “false flag” event to use it as an excuse to invade. They went to the UN ahead of the incident.
Russia knew about our dealings in Benghazi and warned the US to knock it off or there would be consequences. They also went to the UN to have the operation shut down. Which the US ignored.
Maybe this coup attempt has been in the works for some time.
Maybe we had a Department of State that had zero OPSEC or COMSEC accountability for decades?
Maybe we had a Secretary of State who has SAP programs on aserver in her bathroom closet.
Perhaps, but then why is obama seeking rapprochement with Iran, even to the point of illegally giving them $400 million in cash?? Despite their continued taunts and threats, he seems to be doing his best to suck up to to the Mullahs in Teheran.
What I meant by BS is specifically this: Erdogan is trying to interpret the Su downing episode as an operation done behind his back by the plotters/Gulenists/US/Saudis.
In reality he clearly went ahead with it, just changed his mind later -- in part due to the Russian economic countermeasures -- and now is trying to clean the record. -----
On an aside, Erdogan -- unlike Putin -- is a tactician. He always does what he thinks is the best thing to do today, he never thinks what may happen tomorrow.
Looks like he is using both sides against the middle.
But the impression I'm getting is of a small-time crook trying to play poker with big Mafia guys. We know how this usually ends.
Presidents Obama’s agenda is not the same as the CIAs or deep state. If anything they seem to be working against each other, as in Syria.
The world just got a little more complicated. I guess Russia is happy that Turkey’s refugee exports are going to other way.
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