Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec. 21/ Trend G.Mehdi/
Iranian private sector company SANIR will implement a project, worth $108 million, in Sri Lanka aimed to provide electricity to around one thousand villages in the country, IRNA reported.
According to Sri Lanka's Power and Energy Ministry's website, the project, dubbed as "RE8", is to serve remote areas as well as un-electrified gap areas in between already electrified areas.
The project is expected to bring benefits to about 180,000 rural households.
On December 11, Sri Lankan Industry and Commerce Minister Rishad Bathiyutheen met with Iranian Industry, Mine, and Trade Minister Mehdi Ghazanfari in Tehran, discussing ways to diversify and expand industrial and trade ties, IRNA reported.
Ghazanfari said that the value of bilateral trade stands at $1.6 billion annually (including oil trade).
U.S. sanctions against Iran had compelled Sri Lanka to pay an additional sum of $1.2 billion for the import of crude oil and refined oil, Sri Lankan Petroleum Minister Susil Premjayanth said in October.
The Minister said that the country's oil bill had reached $5 billion by now.
The government had made arrangements to purchase crude from Saudi Arabia and other oil producing nations and orders had been placed for 135,000 million tons of light crude and another 80,000 million tons in the open market.