Iran-Pakistan gas deal operational by Friday

TEHRAN, March 17 (MNA) – Tehran and Islamabad will sign the operating contract of gas export from Iran to Pakistan by Friday, the Iranian deputy oil minister said here on Tuesday.

According to Hojjatollah Ghanimifard, the contract will be inked in Turkey, and Pakistan has declared its readiness to transit gas to India.

India was also a part of the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline, but walked out of the 2,775 km pipeline project mainly due to the hefty transit fee demanded by Islamabad.

The negotiations have been going on for many years involving Iran, Pakistan and India. Iran’s enormous gas reserves are ideally suited to supply massive amounts of gas to both Pakistan and India on long-term basis, thus helping ease the energy requirements of the two giant developing nations.

Iran, Pakistan, and India conceptualized the Peace Pipeline project in 1990s, to help boost peace and security in the region.

Negotiations over the project were initiated in 1994 between the three countries but there were obstacles to closing the three-way deal due to tension between India and Pakistan.

Due to the tense India-Pakistan relations, New Delhi stepped back from the later stages of negotiations, although it has never formally withdrawn from the project.

During the talks, the Indian officials had asked Iran to sort out a number of issues, such as the security of the pipeline and the gas price formula.

India didn’t participate in the last several rounds of talks, but Iran repeatedly encouraged India to rejoin the process.

Iran holds world’s second-largest gas reserves after Russia.