BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 17 (UPI) -- The 500th tanker of oil from the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan export pipeline left Azerbaijan with 630,000 barrels of crude oil destined for Italy, BP officials said.

"The crude, which comes from the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli and Shah Deniz fields in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea, was destined for Trieste (Italy)," a statement from BP Azerbaijan said.

The statement adds the rate of exports from the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan line approaches nearly 850,000 barrels of crude oil per day, with projections for the end of the year reaching 1 million barrels per day, the Azerbaijan Business Center reported Tuesday.

"Work is currently under way to increase the capacity of the pipeline by up to 20 percent to 1.2 million barrels per day," BP added.

The 1,099-mile Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline carries gas from Azerbaijan through Georgia to the southern Mediterranean coast of Turkey.