US firm General Electric Co.has signed a 600-million-dollar (515-million-euro) power station construction and renovation deal aimed at increasing Turkmenistan\'s electricity exports, the Central Asian country\'s main newspaper said on Saturday. \"By increasing generating capacity by 35 percent to 40 percent the agreement will allow an increase in exports to Afghanistan, Turkey and elsewhere,\" the official Neitralny Turmenistan daily said. By 2011 General Electric will build two new natural gas-fired power stations, one in the capital Ashkhabad, the other in Dashoguz, the newspaper said. General Electric will also increase capacity at five existing power stations and renovate power generation facilities at an oil refinery in the Caspian coastal town of Turkmenbashi, the newspaper said. In May Ashkhabad signed the first in a series of electricity supply contracts with neighboring Iran that could eventually net Turkmenistan 140 million dollars annually. By 2011 Turkmenistan will be able to generate 4,600 megawatts of electricity annually, compared to 3,100 megawatts annually at the moment, Neitralny Turkmenistan said on Saturday. In addition to Iran, another buyer of Turkmen electricity is Afghanistan, to which Ashkhabad was a supplier during the period of Taliban rule that ended following the US-led military campaign in 2001. (AFP)