ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Sept. 20 (UPI) -- Delegates from the Pakistani government scheduled the signing of an agreement for a trilateral gas pipeline during talks in Turkmenistan, an official said.
Delegates from Turkmenistan and Afghanistan were to have met in Kabul to sign an agreement on a natural gas pipeline to Pakistan and India at the end of August.
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 has more than 40 trillion cubic feet of gas in its Dauletabad gas field.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari ordered Naveed Qamar, the Pakistani petroleum and natural resources minister, to head Monday to Ashgabat to sign a framework on the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-India gas pipeline, ministry sources told Pakistani newspaper The Daily Times.
The Asian Development Bank financed a feasibility study for TAPI in 2005 despite the war in Afghanistan. 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.
