Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday it was impossible for Turkey to stop buying oil and natural gas from Iran, despite the threat of U.S. sanctions, and added that trade between the two countries would continue, according to broadcaster NTV.

Turkey's liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports reached a record high at 7.14 billion cubic meters in the first half of 2019, according to Turkey's Energy Market Regulatory Authority's (EMRA) data.

Russia expressed its readiness to cooperate with Turkey in its oil and gas explorations in the eastern Mediterranean.

Turkey has made continuous efforts to protect its sovereign rights and the rights of Turkish Cypriots in the Eastern Mediterranean region, where it has been drilling in its exclusive economic zone (EEZ), which was registered with the United Nations in 2004.

The natural gas pipeline project TurkStream, which will carry Russian gas to Turkey and Europe, as well as Turkey's first nuclear power Akkuyu, currently under construction by the Russian firm Rosatom, are two prominent strategic projects.

The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) is due to purchase crude oil from Iraq next month to process at the SOCAR Turkey Aegean Refinery (STAR) inaugurated in October 2018 in Izmir.

"We are not getting any oil from Iran now," said the Turkey's official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "We were one of the eight countries getting an exception from those sanctions, and now we are ready to abide by them," he said.

To further explore opportunities for bilateral energy expansion, Turkish Energy and Natural Resources Minister Fatih Dönmez and German Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Energy Peter Altmaier met in Ankara for the second Turkish-German Energy Forum in October last year to sign a letter of intent to enhance the Turkish-German energy partnership.

Alparslan Bayraktar, deputy minister of energy and natural resources, stated that there is great potential for the natural gas market between Turkey and the U.S., in an address at the 37th Annual Conference on Turkey-U.S. Relations organized by the Turkey-U.S. Business Council (TAİK) and the American Turkish Council (ATC) in the U.S. capital Washington, D.C.

DS - Turkey's monthly liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports reached a historic record high at 2.34 billion cubic meters (bcm) in January 2019, according to Turkey's Energy Market Regulatory Authority (EMRA) data.