A five-member delegation, headed by Hussain, was expected to go to Turkmenistan for attending a ministerial conference on energy, risk and security, where the Pakistani team would hold mutual discussions with Turkmenistan officials about the planned Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan (TAP) gas pipeline.
In the wake of no major development in the much-delayed TAP pipeline project, Pakistan has decided to ask Turkmenistan to give its share of gas under the TAP project to Iran, which will provide the same to Pakistan through IP gas line, he said.
This means the imported gas will be available at $5-6 per mmbtu. We also want to use the IP gas line for importing Turkmenistan gas, as the TAP project seems unlikely because of security issues in Afghanistan, he said.
Turkmenistan is already providing gas to Iran since 1997 and Pakistan wants to utilize the infrastructure laid down between both the nations for importing from the Dualatabad gas field.
Pakistan will also request for the documentation of gas reserves in the Dualatabad gas field whose report from the international experts has not been delivered until now to the buyer nations under the TAP project.
Under the TAP project, Turkmenistan is to provide 3.2 billion cubic feet gas to Afghanistan and Pakistan. If the work on this project kicks off soon, which seems impossible, then Afghanistan will be having $1 per mmbtu as transit fee, he said.
