Turkey Cannot Halt Oil Shipments From Azerbaijan To Israel Without UN Sanctions – OpEd
Turkey lacks the authority to halt oil shipments from Azerbaijan to Israel without a UN sanctions resolution. At most, Turkey can request or advise Azerbaijan on the matter.
Ultimately, Azerbaijan has the sole right to decide who buys its oil. If Turkey were to block shipments through the BTC (Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan) pipeline because they are destined for Israel, it would be liable for compensating investors and producers for their financial losses. The agreements governing BTC, IGA, and HGA pipelines are structured to protect such investments; otherwise, investors would be unwilling to fund these major projects.
The BTC pipeline and the broader East-West energy corridor were initially conceived with the goal of securing energy supplies for Israel. For instance, prior to the Blue Stream project, there was the Lassere Project, which aimed to transport natural gas to Israel. Gazprom, one of the Lassere Project partners, adapted the plan to cross the Black Sea, proposing three pipeline routes: two lines for Turkey and one for Israel, each with a capacity of 8 billion cubic meters. However, when Israel discovered its own offshore natural gas reserves, the Israeli pipeline portion of the project was abandoned.
The United States places a high priority on ensuring Israel’s energy security, given Israel’s role as its most important ally in the region. From their perspective, this focus is understandable. We are not presenting these observations as a criticism but to illustrate that the realities we recognized in the past are now becoming more widely understood.
