US warns Pakistan on Iran gas pipeline deal: report
17 Sep 2011
The US is reported to have asked Pakistan to abandon plans to import natural gas from Iran through a multi-billion dollar gas pipeline and instead invest in the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) project.
The Iran-Pakistan pipeline project, originally planned as a joint venture by Iran, Pakistan and India, did not go well with India, partly due to a hostile Pakistan and in part due to US objections to a deal with Iran.
The $7.5-billion deal between Iran and Pakistan envisaged completion of the gas pipeline project by 2014 and Pakistan had repeatedly said it would not back out of the revised project to construct a 900-km gas pipeline from Asalooyeh in southern Iran to Iranshahr near the border with Pakistan.
The US is reported to have offered Pakistan assistance in the TAPI project as an alternate to Islamabad abandoning the Iran gas pipeline project.
Pakistan, however, has reservations on the TAPI project that runs mostly through unsettled Afghanistan as also issues relating to gas prices.
US special envoy for international energy affairs, Carlos Pascual, raised the objection at a high level talks between energy officials of the two countries, The Express Tribune newspaper quoted unnamed officials as saying.
The paper said the US raised its objection to the pipeline project during the fourth round of the energy dialogue with Pakistan that concluded in Islamabad yesterday.
The report also quoted a US embassy spokesperson as confirming US concerns over Pakistan's plans for the pipeline project.
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