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Turkmen president dismisses Turkmengaz chief

Amanaly Khanaliyev has been heading the company for almost 12 months.

ASHGABAT, January 7 (Itar-Tass) — Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov dismissed the chairman of the state-run energy company TurkmenGaz for drawbacks in fulfilling his functions.

He signed the relevant decree at the Cabinet meeting on Friday.

Amanaly Khanaliyev has been heading the company for almost 12 months.

Akmurad Yegeleyev, who served as chairman of Turkmenneftegazstroi, will replace him. Yegeleyev’s deputy, Amanaly Gurbanov, will head the energy-focused construction company.

In January-November 2011 TurkmenGaz’ output exceeded 40.5 billion cubic meters of gas, of them around 25 billion cubic meters were exported to foreign markets.

Turkmengaz exports gas to three destinations – Russia, China and Iran. Natural gas is Turkmenistan’s main export item that accounts for up to 60 percent of the Central Asian country’s revenues.

Speaking about the tasks for Turkmenistan’s oil and gas industry at the Cabinet meeting Berdymukhamedov stressed the need for increasing the share of value-added products in the fuel export structure.

According to the International Reserves Audit, Turkmenistan ranks the world’s fourth, while its gas deposit Galkynysh with the gas reserves of 26.2 trillion cubic meters ranks the world’s second largest after the offshore gas condensate field North Dome/South Pars in the Persian Gulf.

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