U.S. Official: ‘Anti-Monopoly’ is Caspian Energy Policy Priority

U.S. Senior Advisor for Caspian Basin Energy Diplomacy Ambassador Steven Mann said on March 10 that “core” of U.S. Caspian energy policy is “anti-monopoly” and called on the Georgian government for “great caution” while considering plans over selling the country’s trunk gas pipelines to the Russian energy giant Gazprom.

Steven Mann was speaking at public discussions on Caspian Gas and European Energy Security, organized by the Washington-based think-tank Jamestown Foundation, the America-Georgia Business Development Council and the U.S.-Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce.

Steven Mann said that U.S.-backed Shah-Deniz gas pipeline project will give Georgia “the possibility of an alternative supply of gas, in other words an end to the total dependence on Gazprom.”

“We believe that it is important for Georgia to diversify its energy supplies,” he said, however added, that “the fate of Shah-Deniz does not rest on the sale or non-sale of Georgia’s pipelines.”

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