share Print After nearly 30 years of talks, arguments, and threats, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan have agreed to jointly develop a disputed hydrocarbon field that lies in the Caspian Sea about midway between the two countries. Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding on the development of the Dostlug field at a videoconference meeting on January 21. While an agreement on the hydrocarbon field is a major step in the improvement of relations between the two Caspian littoral countries, it also rekindles the prospect of the construction of a trans-Caspian pipeline. The name of the field -- Dostlug or “Friendship” -- symbolizes compromise.