Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR has assured the Bulgarian authorities that the first gas deliveries to Bulgaria can be made in 2020, Bulgaria’s Deputy Minister of Energy Zhecho Stankov announced after a meeting with the management of SOCAR in Baku. The new infrastructure of the Southern Gas Corridor will start functioning in 2020. On the other hand, we have been informing our Azerbaijani partners on a monthly basis about the state of construction of the gas interconnection between Bulgaria and Greece, Deputy Minister Stankov further said. That country has assured us that in 2020 Bulgaria will start receiving through the Southern Gas Corridor 1 billion cubic meters of gas. Zhecho Stankov also pointed out that after 2023 Bulgaria will have the opportunity to import higher gas quantities from Azerbaijan from other gas deposits. So far Bulgargaz signed a contract for the purchase of 1 billion cubic meters of gas per year from Shah Deniz 2 gas field.