ID :
81556
Thu, 09/24/2009 - 20:52
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ADB'S HEAD SAYS NABUCCO TO MAKE TURKEY STRONGER

PLON/ANKARA (A.A) - 24.09.2009 - The head of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said on Thursday that Nabucco natural gas project would make Turkey a strong country.
ADB's president Haruhiko Kuroda said Nabucco natural gas project and other pipeline projects would make Turkey a strong country both in Asia and Europe.
Turkey had become a bridge between the energy resources and consumers with the recent Nabucco project, Kuroda told AA correspondent on the sidelines of a global economic symposium in Plon, Germany.
The 3,300-kilometer Nabucco pipeline will carry Caspian and Central Asian natural gas to Austria in Europe to reduce EU dependence on Russian gas. Nearly 2,000 kilometers of the pipeline will run in Turkey.
Kuroda said countries that wanted to be strong in the future were the countries that would control the regions where energy resources were located and the transportation routes.
Also, Kuroda said Turkey had strengthened its banking system with reforms it had fulfilled since 2002, and had witnessed the benefits of those reforms in the recent global financial crisis.
Kuroda said Turkish banks had not been affected by the global crisis, and those reforms should be an example for all other developing countries.
Although banks bankrupted in developed countries, not a single bank went bankrupt in Turkey, he said.
Kuroda also said there was no need to extend financial contributions to Turkish banking sector, and Turkey had the potential to catch up with its economic growth in recent years.
Established in 1966, the Asian Development Bank is an international development finance institution whose mission is to help its developing member countries reduce poverty and improve the quality of life of their people.
Turkey became a member of the bank in 1991 as a non-regional member.

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