MOSCOW, Sept. 9 (UPI) -- Despite backing for the project, there are numerous concerns about plans to build a gas pipeline from Turkmenistan, a U.S. official said from Moscow.
A 1,043-mile pipeline would move gas from the Dauletabad gas field in Turkmenistan to consumers in Pakistan and India after transiting Afghanistan. Turkmenistan holds more than 40 trillion cubic feet of gas in the Dauletabad field.
Robert Blake, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, told the Russian news agency Kommersant that while the project was attractive, there were several concerns about the pipeline.
"Many, many details need to be worked out, not the least of which will be the exact route for such a pipeline, the security arrangements and also whether they will be able to attract commercial financing for this project," he said.
Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov had said Afghan President Hamid Karzai agreed to discuss the TAPI pipeline on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly's 65th session scheduled later this month at U.N. headquarters in New York.
The project is seen as a rival to Iran's plans to build its own pipeline to Pakistan from the giant offshore South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf.
