Baku, Azerbaijan, April 24
By Farhad Daneshvar – Trend:
An Iranian oil official has said that his country will launch exporting gas to the southern Iraqi city of Basra within the current fiscal year which began on March 20.
Hamidreza Araqi, an Iranian deputy oil minister, said on Tuesday that his country will export 60 million cubic meters of gas per day to Basra, Fars news agency reported.
According to the official, Iran’s gas output over the current year is expected to reach 250 billion cubic meters per day. The country currently produces 210 billion cubic meters per day.
The Iraqi government approved a deal in late 2017 to import gas from Iran to the eastern border province of Diyala, increasing purchases of the Iranian fuel, which started in June after several years of delays.
Under the deal, Iran is obliged to supply gas to power plants in the western neighbor’s capital city, Baghdad and also Basra.
Iran is currently delivering 12 million cubic meters of gas to Baghdad on a daily basis.
Iraq is the second largest gas customer of Iran after Turkey which imports 30 million cubic meters of gas from Iran per day.