ASHGABAT, June 24 (RIA Novosti) - Turkmenistan will supply up to 40 billion cubic meters of natural gas to China for 30 years as soon as it commissions a pipeline at the end of 2009, the ex-Soviet republic's president said on Wednesday.

"The project is a strategic one for both countries - it meets the long-term interests of both Turkmenistan and China and also corresponds to the logic of global economic development in which energy supplies have been playing an ever increasing role," Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov said, as quoted by national media, after talks with Executive Deputy Premier of the Chinese State Council Li Keqiang.

The parties also signed a range of documents, including an agreement for a Chinese $4 billion loan to the Turkmengaz state-run gas corporation.