The Iranian news agency IRNA reports that on 24 April Hamid Reza Araqi, managing director of the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC), said that by next month, Iranian and Turkmen experts will review Iran-Turkmenistan differences on their dispute and hoped to reach agreement on the issue so that the case is not referred to the court.
Araqi once again complained about the low quality of gas supplied from Turkmenistan, which is the reason behind imposing additional penalties on Ashgabat by Iran.
Iran’s Minister of Petroleum Bijan Zangeneh was quoted as saying that the quality of Turkmen gas is low.
Since the start of the gas dispute between Ashgabat and Tehran, Iran’s officials have repeatedly threatened Turkmenistan to refer the case to the International Court of Arbitration.
Let us recall that in late 2016 a public row broke out between Iran and Turkmenistan after Turkmengaz demanded that the NIGC settle the debt of $1,8 billion.
The Iran media outlets reported that after lengthy negotiations the sides had come to mutual agreement.Despite this, on 1 January 2017 Turkmenistan cut off gas supply to Iran.