TEHRAN, Feb 6: A 50 per cent drop in Turkmen gas exports to Iran has ended before causing any problems to the supply of heating fuel in mid-winter, Iranian officials said.

In a statement posted on the National Iranian Gas Company (NIGC) website on Monday, NIGC Managing Director Javad Oji said supplies of gas from Turkmenistan had fallen due to very cold weather in Central Asia.

But Tehran's envoy to Turkmenistan said the drop in supplies to the Islamic state was short lived. The problem that led to a cut of around 50 per cent of Turkmen gas exports to Iran has been resolved, Mohammad Mousa Hahshemi Golpaygani told the semi-official news agency.

"The drop stemmed from technical problems and sub-zero temperatures".

Oji said that, although cold weather in Iran was stoking demand for heating gas, no Iranian city had suffered supply problems during the brief cut, which reduced flows from 20 million cubic metres a day (mcm/day) to 10 mcm/day.

Turkmen government officials could not immediately be reached for comment on the reasons for the cut in exports to Iran.

Iran sits on the world's second-largest gas reserves but has to import gas, because its own consumption has risen more markedly than its production. Iran exports gas to Turkey and Armenia when it can but relies on Turkmenistan to supply the extra gas it needs during cold winter months for heating.

Turkmenistan also exports gas to Europe via Russia, where bitterly cold weather has led to shortages in the gas it supplies to parts of the EU in the past year, and to China across Kazakhstan.

Rssian gas export monopoly Gazprom said on Saturday it had brought supplies to European countries back to normal after lowering them for six days while unusually cold weather in Russia raised domestic demand.The European Commission said on Monday that gas supplies to the European Union from Russia improved over the weekend but had not fully returned to previous levels.

In 2008, Turkmenistan stopped sending gas to Iran during a dispute, but the countries signed a new agreement in 2009 and have since opened a new pipline link and Iran's imports have risen sharply over the past year.-Reuters