Gas war

14 Aug 2008 By Pierre Briancon

Russian planes did try to bomb the BakuTbilisiCeyhan pipeline, the Wall Street Journal has found. By making Georgia unsafe, Moscow wants to make sure Western countries will think twice before trying to bypass Russia for their energy supplies.

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The Russian air force tried to bomb the BakuTbilisiCeyhan (BTC) oil pipeline that carries azeri oil to the Turkish coast across Georgia, the Wall Street Journal reported August 14.

A correspondent for the newspaper wrote that he saw 45 bomb craters near the pipeline's route in a deserted area 15 miles south of Tbilisi, which seemed to contradict Russian authorities' denegations that they had tried to destroy the pipeline.

BP, the British oil major, cited security concerns earlier this week as it shut down a gas pipeline running alongside BTC as well as a shorter oil pipeline carrying azeri oil to the Georgia coast.

BP had shut down BTC last week after an explosion in Eastern Turkey.

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