Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan took part in the ceremony of completing the construction of the offshore section of the Turkish Stream gas pipeline via a video conference.
Speaking at the ceremony, the Russian president stressed that the pipeline had shown the effectiveness of work with Turkey on the extremely complicated projects.
"We are here to witness a very important event that clearly shows how our countries can effectively work together as partners on implementing the most complicated and ambitious projects," the Russian leader said.
He further noted that projects like Turkish Stream are not directed against anyone and added that the pipeline project was fully in line with Turkey's national interests.
"The projects of this kind, and this project, in particular, are not directed against anyone's interests. The projects of this kind have a purely constructive character. They are aiming to develop the relationship between the states, create sustainable conditions for economy development, for the growth of our countries' citizens' well-being based on this," Putin said.
The Russian president thanked his Turkish counterpart for the political will and courage in the Turkish Stream implementation, saying that such projects were impossible without that.
The Russian president said he was expecting the onshore stretch of the pipeline to be built just as fast as the offshore one. "We are expecting the work to be done just as fast so as to launch the pipeline as planned before the end of 2019," Putin said.
Gazprom has begun construction of the offshore section of the Turkish Stream in May 2017. The offshore section of the 930 km pipeline runs along the bottom of the Black Sea to the coast of Turkey. The pipeline will be continues by a 180-km land transit line to the border of Turkey with neighboring countries.
The first line will be designed for the Turkish market, the second - for gas supply to the countries of South and Southeast Europe. The capacity of each line is 15.75 billion cubic meters of gas per year. The first deliveries are scheduled for the end of 2019. Gazprom announced the completion of deep-sea laying of the offshore section of the first Turkish Stream in April 2018.
