“Azerbaijan is like a guy of medium height who has found himself at an NBA (National Basketball Association) party. It is funny to claim a serious place in the [natural gas] market when in the neighborhood of Iran, Russia and Turkmenistan. The country?s resources are more than enough to meet domestic demand and to sell some gas to neighbors, but too minor to compete with such strong neighbors.”
“Georgia?s transit fee was doubled at the expense of Azerbaijan?s share in the project. Besides, the gas price in the barter deal [gas in exchange for transit service] with Georgia was calculated according to a very moderate regional price rather than the world market price.”
