TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Iran is not ready to satisfy EU’s gas demand and replace Russia as a key supplier if sanctions against Tehran are lifted, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said.
 

"As you know, Iran has the largest deposits of gas, but we lag behind in gas output and so we first think about the domestic demands," President Rouhani in an interview with Rossiya 1 news channel.




The Iranian president added that “from time to time” Iran has problems with gas during winter.

“We have many buyers, clients around us... All our neighbors to the east, west and south want to buy gas which we are yet to extract," he said.

According to the president, "now the conditions are not like those when everybody thinks that if Russia stops gas supplies (to the EU), Iran would provide (Europe) with the same (amount of) gas."

He added that the country’s production is “far from this stage."

In the meantime, Rouhani said that Iran is willing to cooperate with Russia in the gas sector.

Iran is now holder of the world’s largest natural gas reserves. It has an estimated 1,193 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves and the world’s fourth-biggest oil deposits of 157 billion barrels, according to BP Plc (BP/)’s Statistical Review published in June 2014.

By Tasnim News Agency

 

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