ASHGABAT: Saudi Arabia has expressed support for the Ashgabat-initiated project on construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) transnational gas pipeline.
This was announced at a meeting of the Turkmen-Saudi intergovernmental commission that took place in Riyadh, the Turkmen government said in a message on Saturday.
Turkmenistan’s Deputy Prime Minister Maksat Babayev reported on the results of the Riyadh visit during a meeting of the Turkmen government on November 10.
Babayev said the talks have created opportunities for attracting Saudi investments in international and national projects in the oil and gas sector, searching for and extracting minerals, and developing communications.
“Intention was expressed for mutually beneficial cooperation on projects implemented in Turkmenistan’s gas chemical and industrial sectors, transportation, communications, mining and other spheres,” says the Turkmen government’s message.
Construction of the Turkmen section of TAPI started in 2015 and is scheduled to be finished in late 2018.
The total length of the TAPI pipeline will be 1,814 kilometres. A 214-kilometre section of the pipeline will run through Turkmenistan, a 774-kilometre section will run through Afghanistan and an 826-kilometre section will run through Pakistan to Fazilka settlement on the border with India. The pipeline’s annual capacity will be 33 billion cubic meters of gas.
any pipe line passing through Pakistan and entering India to supply gas to India will be a non starter.
Let Turkeministan find another way to sell to India.