Georgia has arranged to start importing natural gas from Iran as early as January-February next year in a bid to guarantee its energy security and to avoid force majeure, Niki Gilauri, the Georgian energy minister, referring to ITAR-TASS, AzerTAj reported.

The agreement was reached during Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili's visit to Iran last week, Mr. Gilauri said.

Georgia currently receives gas produced in Turkmenistan via Russia under contracts with Russian gas monopoly Gazprom and the Itera energy group.

Above all, Georgia is worried about accidents occurring along the gas pipeline that links Georgia with Russia. Gilauri said the infrastructure to import gas from Iran existed but needed to be rehabilitated. The pipeline runs across Azerbaijan and used to supply Georgia with gas in Soviet times. Georgian experts think it would only take four months at the most to renovate the line at a cost of approximately $1.8 million.

Gilauri said Iranian gas was of high quality and cost more than Russian gas. "But from the point of view of diversification it is very important to find an alternative supplier of this fuel to Georgia," he said.

An agreement was also reached to supply Georgian mineral water to Iran, so Georgia might be able to barter this for gas, Gilauri said.

Georgia received 1.009 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas in 2003 - 257 million cu m of it from under contracts with Gazprom's export arm Gazexport and 752 million cu m under contracts with Itera.

In other development, Georgian Daily 'Akhalgazrda Ivereli' in its Tuesday edition quoted Niki Gilauri as saying that the country is interested in purchasing electricity from Iran. "We have the opportunity to buy electricity from three countries," Gilauri said adding, "presently, we are purchasing electricity from Russia and Armenia."

He allude to Iran as the third country which is in a position to sell electricity to Tbilisi.

Iran has rendered a good proposal for exports of 100 megawatts of electricity to Georgia, he added.

"If Iran electricity's quality and price are suitable compared to that of the two other countries, then we will definitely be interested in a deal," he said.

The daily further said the Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili to Tehran signed a contract between Iran and Georgia in the recent trip for transfer of electricity from Iran to the Black Sea nation.

The volume of transactions between Iran and Georgia in 2001 stood at dlrs 31.2 million, of which dlrs 19.5 million made up Iran's exports to Georgia and dlrs 11.7 million being the republic's exports to Iran.

It reached dlrs 53.8 million in 2003, as Iran's exports to Georgia stood at dlrs 38.6 million and imports from the country to Iran toped dlrs 15.1 million.