By Natalia Konarzewska

December 7th, 2015, The CACI Analyst

After meeting with Gazprom’s CEO Alexei Miller in Milan on September 25, Georgia’s Energy Minister Kakha Kaladze announced that the parties discussed increasing Russia’s transit of gas to Armenia and opened a possibility for Georgian commercial entities to buy additional volumes of Russian gas. In October, Kaladze reiterated that Tbilisi wants to diversify its natural gas routes and suppliers through imports from Russia and possibly Iran. No details about the eventual increase of gas shipments from Russia have so far been revealed. Yet the prospective agreement has already caused controversy among Georgian political opposition, which questions Gazprom’s reliability as a gas supplier, and raised concerns in Azerbaijan, which is Georgia’s largest gas provider.

By Mina Muradova

November 30th, the CACI Analyst

In recent weeks, a political controversy has emerged in Tbilisi over the Georgian government’s negotiations with Gazprom over a return of the Russian natural gas giant to the Georgian market. Georgian officials insist there is no intention to replace gas imports from Georgia’s main supplier Azerbaijan with Russian gas, but Georgia’s own experience of dependency on Gazprom makes the issue highly controversial.

By Stephen Blank

November 20th, 2015, The CACI Analyst

In early October Frontera Corporation announced that it had discovered 3.8 trillion cubic meters (TCM) of gas in Georgia’s Kakheti region. Although the discovery needs to be confirmed and the precise amount of gas determined; this discovery has major potential benefits of both an economic and geopolitical nature for Georgia, Azerbaijan and Europe. But there are lurking dangers as well, especially as the Georgian government recently voiced its intention to sign an agreement with Gazprom for Russian gas and diversify away from its exclusive reliance on Azerbaijan, despite that country’s utter reliability over several years and lack of designs upon Georgia.

By Armen Grigoryan

October 13th, 2015, The CACI Analyst

Tensions along the line of contact in Nagorno-Karabakh and on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border have intensified from September 24, with skirmishes including the use of heavy artillery by both sides. Tensions have grown to a level where the danger of a large-scale confrontation should be seriously considered. Russia’s specific interests aggravate the situation, while the conflicting sides remain reluctant to seek a compromise solution. In this situation, Armenia and Azerbaijan are under increasing pressure to accept a Russia-led peacekeeping mission to the region. 

By Mina Muradova

October 7th, the CACI Analyst

On September 10, 2015, the European Parliament (EP) adopted a resolution calling on Azerbaijan’s authorities to respect to human rights and essential freedoms. According to the resolution, “The overall human rights situation in Azerbaijan has deteriorated continuously over the last few years, with growing intimidation and repression and intensification of the practice of criminal prosecution of NGO leaders, human rights defenders, journalists and other civil society representatives.” European MPs condemned the “unprecedented repression against civil society” in Azerbaijan and urged Azerbaijan to “immediately and unconditionally release all political prisoners from jail,” to drop all charges against them and to fully restore their political and civil rights and public image.