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Huge profits seen for underdeveloped regions

ASHGABAT – The leaders of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Turkmenistan yesterday agreed to move forward with a complicated and risky plan to build a natural gas pipeline across rugged territory plagued by war and insurgency.

The pipeline, which would terminate in India, would bring huge amounts of gas to underdeveloped regions and could earn impoverished Afghanistan hundreds of millions of dollars in transit fees.

The route for the 1,700-kilometre Tapi pipeline from gas-rich Turkmenistan would cross Afghanistan's Kandahar Province, where the Taliban and international forces are locked in battle, as well as some of Pakistan's unruly tribal areas.

Stabilising influence
Concerns about security for the pipeline itself and for the workers who construct it have cast doubt on the project's near-term feasibility, but proponents say it would calm the chaotic region.

"Along with commercial and economic benefits, this project will also yield a stabilising influence on the region and beyond," Turkmen President Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov said after the leaders signed a document supporting the project.

"Afghanistan will live up to its obligations in ensuring the pipeline's construction and safety," said Afghan President Hamid Karzai, whose undertrained army struggles against the resurgent Taliban.

The project has also won vocal support from the United States, which is strongly opposed to India and Pakistan drawing supplies from Iran through another proposed gas pipeline.

Contents of the document signed by Karzai, Berdymukhamedov, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Indian petroleum minister Murli Deora were not immediately made public.

But the apparent next step will be to secure financial backing and firm bids from energy companies, which could prove an uphill struggle for a project so fraught with potential risks.

"This will not be an easy project to complete – it is mandatory that we guarantee the security of the pipeline and the quality of construction work," Asian Development Bank President Haruhiko Kuroda told reporters in the Turkmen capital, Ashgabat.