Islamabad, Feb 22: Turkmen, Afghan and Pakistani ministers began talks here today with the Asian Development Bank on proposals for a massive Trans-Afghan gas pipeline.
The 1,460-km pipeline would carry gas from Turkmenistan's rich Dauletabad fields, home to the world's fifth largest gas reserves, across Afghanistan to Pakistan.
The proposal has been on the drawing board for over 20 years but more than two decades of conflict in Afghanistan and regional tensions had rendered it little more than a pipeline dream until the ouster of the Taliban in late 2001.
The three countries finally inked a framework agreement for project in December.
Turkmenistan's deputy prime minister Yolly Qurbanmuradov and oil minister Tagiev Tachberdi, Afghanistan's minister for mines and industries Juma Mohammad Mohammadi, and
Pakistan's petroleum and natural resources minister Naurez Shakoor led delegations at today's talks to review a feasability study by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
"This is going to be a progress report by the Asian Development Bank on the feasability study it is preparing," the head of Pakistan's petroleum and natural resources department Abdullah Yousaf told a news agency.
The ADB has put up more than a million dollars for a
feasability study. It is also providing risk guarantees to
investors.
The ADB has said the project, which will cost at least
two billion dollars, has the potential to bring unprecedented
prosperity and stability to the impoverished region.
Bureau Report
