Tokyo, 19 March, /AJMEDIA/
Azerbaijan is important for NATO because of energy security, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview with AZERTAC, AJMEDIA reports.
“It was extremely important for NATO allies in Europe to wean off Russian gas, and increased deliveries from Azerbaijan have enabled NATO allies in Europe to be independent of Russia as a gas supplier. And that was a very fast and quick process that actually went quite well, given the very difficult circumstances. There is a demand now for further increasing the gas export from roughly 12 billion cubic meters to 20, which is a significant part of Europe`s gas consumption, and for some allies, gas from Azerbaijan is very important. I also welcome that work has started now not only on providing natural gas, but also exporting power through electric cable and direct export from Azerbaijan of power will further increase the importance of Azerbaijan as an energy supplier to Europe, to NATO allies in Europe. This is also part of the efforts of Azerbaijan to develop renewable sources of energy, wind power, offshore wind but also solar power. And by doing so, Azerbaijan has become a part of the big energy transition, which has to take place if we are going to be able to fight the climate change. In that context, of course, it is also very important that Azerbaijan is playing an important role in hosting COP-29, the big climate conference in November this year. I really believe and hope that COP29 here in Baku will provide us with a platform we need as an international community to make important decisions on many issues related to fighting global warming or climate change, not least climate financing, to finance big investments, we need to conduct the big energy transition,” he said.
