Following the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan paid an official visit to Qatar where Turkish state-owned energy company BOTAŞ and Qatari liquefied natural gas (LNG) producer Qatargas signed an agreement. This agreement, which concerns Turkey's import of LNG from Qatar over the long run, is not only an ordinary trade agreement between two countries, but also a major economic move that will gradually turn into a political one and put an end to Russia's natural gas monopoly strategy in Europe. Since the Ukrainian crisis and the annexation of Crimea, Russia has never been in such a tight spot and has faced an unexpected and undesirable situation. The far-reaching natural gas accord between Turkey and Qatar and the mutual removal of visa obligations will regulate Qatar's export of LNG not only for the Turkish market, but also for the European market in terms of amount and price. So, this agreement also signifies a new situation that will regulate natural gas supply and prices for Europe. Certainly, such a situation will put Russia, which has already been troubled with the issue, in a tighter corner. It is no secret that Russia has been competing with Qatar on natural gas for a long time and Russia wants to oversee Qatar by means of its Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) project - an energy body that can be considered as an equivalent to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). This is why the center of the GECF was founded in the Qatari capital of Doha. Irrespective of the decision the GECF made during the Moscow summit, Qatar has started to export LNG to the European market in growing amounts. The major reason for this is that Qatar lost many of its markets abroad due to the increasing production of shale gas in the U.S. The majority of natural gas facilities in Qatar were established to export LNG to the U.S. Qatar's disruption of Russia's natural gas oligopoly and high supply of LNG has troubled Russian state-run energy company Gazprom since 2012. This is why natural gas prices are falling; Russia unveils discounts and returns billions of dollars to natural gas importing countries as stipulated by flexible contracts. When Russia envisaged the GECF as an equivalent to the OPEC in natural gas, it thought that the GECF would help it supervise countries that produce high amounts of natural gas, such as Qatar, and determine the LNG supply in terms of amount and price. Considering that Qatar produces LNG, Russia left the U.S. market for Qatar and shouldered natural gas supply for the European market on its own. However, the U.S.'s increase of shale gas production and reduction of LNG demand pushed Qatar toward other markets that were Russia's target and led to a major LNG surplus in Qatar. This being the case, Russia cannot hike up natural gas prices for three years.
Indeed, such a situation also distresses Germany, which works with Gazprom in many projects and coins money from Eastern Europe via Gazprom. Now, Qatar supplies one-third of the world's LNG requirement and has started to increase LNG exports to Europe and Asia consecutively. Following this, Russia inked a huge natural gas deal worth as much as $400 billion with China; however, this was not a move that could gear down Qatar. Because of this contention over natural gas, Russia has so far striven to be on good terms with Qatar, so much so that even Qatar's financial support to the Chechens did not disturb Russian President Vladimir Putin. Likewise, just for the sake of the GECF, Russia tolerated Qatar's resolute advocacy of the removal of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Doha's policy on Syria is in the same ballpark with that of Ankara.
The moves that Erdoğan made in Doha will change the whole equitation and disturb the Russia-led natural gas oligopoly. This is not a gain for Turkey alone, but also for the whole of Europe with the exception of Germany. Particularly Eastern European countries will significantly benefit from these moves. Turkey's energy stock market, which will be established soon, will include natural gas and so natural gas prices will be re-determined to be competitive. Along with the decline in oil prices, the re-determination of natural gas prices will profoundly rock Russia and Putin's energy oligarchy. Such a situation might trigger new dynamics that will change balances in the Caucasus, the Middle East and Europe in the medium term. This is because Europe will realize that its dependency on Russian energy is not that critical and that it can overcome the energy problem with alternative projects such as the Southern Gas Corridor (SGC), which Turkey has initiated.
During the Ukrainian and Crimean crises, Russia almost declared itself immune against Europe and Putin made fun of desperate European leaders, saying, "You do not want natural gas, so, will you heat yourself with firewood like your ancestors? Then, you will have to go to Siberia to buy the firewood there," implying that the Europeans are in need of Russia for firewood as well. And all European leaders knew as much as Putin that they would not be able to do what Adolf Hitler had done in the past, in other words, they were aware that they would not be able to attack Russia to seize natural resources in Siberia. Until the recent fighter jet crisis between Turkey and Russia, Russia made the best of the "stalemate," which emerged as a result of the West's crisis. The Ukrainian crisis and the annexation of Crimea came after this.
During the climate summit in Paris, Turkey found an opportunity to explain its arguments and it was understood that Russia's deployment of S-400 missile defense systems in Latakia was not a threat against Turkey alone. Then, NATO started to make statements, which were expected from it. So, we would rather think that the West has been awakened to Russia's intentions. It is out of the question that a political orientation, which wants to reign over the Black Sea and transit trade routes in the north, would remain indifferent to the Mediterranean Sea and southern energy lines.
Russia failed to give a good response to the SGC project, which Turkey initiated with Azerbaijan, and to the Kars-Tbilisi-Baku railway line, which will make the Middle Corridor coming from China a main transit route. As Turkey pondered on a single line instead of four, in the Turkish Stream, Russia's Turkish Stream project could not be an alternative to the SGC.
Considering that southern trade routes would come to the fore and Russia's northern corridor would lose its significance due to Iran's move to open up to the outside, Russia thought that after the Black Sea, it must gain military superiority in the Mediterranean and supervise energy and trade flow there. It can be suggested that a Russian fighter jet would crash near the Turkey-Syria border sooner or later and a similar tension would break out. Russia did this in a planned manner and escalated the tension with the objective of controlling Latakia. With the natural gas agreement with Qatar, Turkey gave a significant response to this tension, which has been initiated by Russia and also threatens the West. And, Erdoğan took a major step for Europe as well, despite Europe itself.
