.TAPI gas pipeline committee to meet in Ashgabat September 20.

10/9 Tass 167

ASHGABAT, September 10 (Itar-Tass) -- Following a two-year break, the
Steering committee of the gas pipeline
Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India /TAPI/ will have a meeting on
September 20 in the capital of Turkmenistan, Deputy Prime Minister
Baimurad Khodzhamukhamedov said over the government's meeting on Thursday.
On September 18-19, prior the meeting, experts of the technical
working group will meet for their discussions.
"Draft agreements, which will be prepared over the technical
consultations and the meeting of the Steering committee, will be presented
for further signing over the meeting of the TAPI country leaders in
Ashgabat in December," he said.
Leaders of Afghanistan and Pakistan and India's prime minister have
confirmed their participation in the summit.
The TAPI project negotiations have been going on for 15 years. The
latest - tenth meeting of the Steering committee was organised in April
2008 in Islamabad. The parties signed a quartet "framework agreement to
begin in 2010 the construction of the trans-Afghanistan pipeline to
deliver gas from Turkmenistan to South Asia." The price of the project was
quoted at 7.6 billion dollars then. The first supplies of gas were due in
2015. Over 2008, representatives of the four countries agreed to organise
an investment consortium for research of the technical design and other
preparatory works. The Asian Development Bank will play a key role in
financing of the project.
The main resource for the pipeline was considered to be Turkmenistan's
major deposit - Dauletabad, which presently serves supplies to Russia and
Iran. Turkmenistan has agreements with those countries for supplies of gas
for 25 years. Back in 2006, near the Dauletabad deposit, there was opened
a new South Yolotan-Osman gas deposit with the capacity of 16 trillion
cubic metres of gas.
-0-kar/mil


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