NICOSIA, Feb. 12 (Xinhua) -- Israel and Cyprus are currently focused on the EastMed pipeline that could be "one of the greatest underwater projects in the world", Israel's President Reuven Rivlin said on a state visit to Cyprus on Tuesday.
Declaring that Israeli-Cypriot relations have never before been so close, Rivlin said that there must be more pipelines and bridges connecting peoples in order to share the benefits in the fields of energy, technology, health, security and the environment.
The EastMed project, under consideration by Cyprus, Israel, Greece and Italy, is a 2,200-km long underwater pipe intended to carry natural gas from eastern Mediterranean gas fields to Europe.
At an estimated cost of 7.5 billion euros, the pipe could be one of the longest in the world and also one of the most expensive of its kind, as it will run great depths on the sea bed from the eastern Mediterranean to Cyprus, Greece and Italy.
The leaders of Cyprus, Greece and Israel who met at a trilateral summit in Beersheba, Israel in December, said they were ready to proceed with an inter-state agreement on the EastMed pipe to be signed in Greece this year.
EU has designated the proposed pipe as a Project of Common Interest and has tasked the European Commission to evaluate it.
Designed to carry 10 billion cubic meters of gas a year from Cypriot and Israeli gas fields to Europe, it has been described as a technologically difficult project requiring funding by investors as the four countries and EU cannot fund it by themselves.
Speaking at a joint press conference after talks in Nicosia, Rivlin and Cypriot president Nicos Anastasiades said they have had detailed discussions on the sectors of energy cooperation, security, economy, tourism, research and innovation.
Rivlin said that thanks to the exchange of information and cooperation on security and in fighting terrorism, Cyprus, Israel and the Mediterranean are very safe.
Anastasiades said Rivlin's visit marked the start of a new era of cooperation based on the common vision of the two countries.
He added that there has been an ongoing upgrade of relations in the sectors discussed and singled out energy, saying that it consists a strategic pillar of the cooperation of the two countries.
