Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, Feb.21 / Trend H. Hasanov /
Participants of a meeting of a technical working group on Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline project, which was recently held in Ashgabat, intend to continue to discuss and agree on the remaining issues at the next meeting scheduled for the near future, an official Turkmen source said.
The last meeting considered many sections of the agreement on natural gas sales. Sources close to the talks reported without accurate definition that "agreements were reached on many issues."
It is expected that the considered documents will be signed in the first half of 2011 , which will allow starting the project. Besides experts of the countries interested in the project, the representatives of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) are invited to the event.
An intergovernmental and a framework agreement between TAPI project participating countries signed in December 2010 in Ashgabat is a basic document for talks on the project.
As Indian and Pakistani media outlets reported, Turkmengaz offers to bind the cost of natural gas during sale to fuel products - fuel oil, kerosene, or liquefied gas, with what future importers of TAPI project are not agree.
The length of the TAPI pipeline can hit more than 17,000 kilometers. Its design capacity is 33 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year. Besides Dovletabad Field, Yoloten, developed by Turkmenistan, will be a resource base. This field is one of the world's super giants, with 22 trillion cubic meters of gas.
As is known, Ashgabat is also ready to act as an organizer of the peace conference of the U.N. to stabilize the situation in Afghanistan, through which TAPI will be laid.