Secretary General: It is up to Azerbaijan to decide whether or not to join the Gas Exporting Countries Forum

Baku. 23 October. REPORT.AZ/ It is only for Azerbaijan to decide whether to join Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF), GECF Secretary General Yury Sentyurin told Report.

According to him, Azerbaijan is a country observer since 2016. It is watching the organization’s activities, opportunities and advantages that the country will receive by becoming a full member of the organization.

"Due to the observer status, Azerbaijan does not have some of the opportunities that full members have. But it is up to Azerbaijan to decide whether or not to join the Gas Exporting Countries Forum. As a general secretary I think that, of course, if Azerbaijan decides to become a full member of the GECF, I would certainly welcome it,” Senturin said.

According to him, the terms of entry are set out in the statute and the intergovernmental agreement signed in December 2008, and if the country shares them, it has the right to apply for membership.

"The main thing is that the country should be a net exporter of natural gas. And the second important factor is the support of the principles of the intergovernmental agreement on equal sovereign rights of our states (members of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum) to the use of national natural resources, " the secretary general noted.

Notably, apart from Azerbaijan, the GECF has six more observer countries: Iraq, Oman, Peru, Kazakhstan, the Netherlands and Norway.

The Forum includes 12 gas exporting countries, such as Algeria, Bolivia, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela and UAE. The GECF was founded in 2001 in Tehran and was established legally on December 23, 2008 in Moscow, where the energy ministers of the participating countries adopted the charter of the forum and signed an intergovernmental agreement. The GECF member-states account for 42 percent of global gas production and 70 percent of its global reserves.