Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov has threatened to bring the country’s gas infrastructure back under state control if Russia’s Gazprom fails to fulfil its commitments to expand gasification across the country.

Axar.az reports, citing Kyrgyz media, that Japarov recalled that Kyrgyzstan’s gas system was sold to Gazprom in 2013 for a symbolic price of one dollar.

“The agreement contains clauses under which Gazprom is required to allocate funds for the gasification of the entire country. However, these clauses have still not been fulfilled. For two or three years now, I have been saying: if you do not deliver, I will take it back, as we did with Kumtor, and do it myself,” he said.

Gazprom Kyrgyzstan attributed the delays to insufficient pipeline capacity and the need to modernise infrastructure. The company plans to increase the country’s gasification rate to 60% by 2030.

In 2022, Kyrgyzstan brought the Kumtor gold mine, previously operated by Canada’s Centerra Gold, under state control.