NEW DELHI, 12 July 2005 — A seven-member Pakistani delegation headed by Petroleum Secretary Ahmad Waqar arrived here yesterday to discuss a three-nation gas pipeline proposal. The delegation will take part in the first meeting of the Joint Working Committee (JWG) today and tomorrow.
Apart from discussing the progress made so far in the 2,600-km pipeline, the talks would also focus on converting the bilateral dialogue into trilateral one, government sources said.
JWG was established after Indian Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar’s Pakistan visit last month. The JWG meeting follows the signing of a memorandum of understanding last week in Islamabad between Iran and Pakistan for implementation of the pipeline project.
At the beginning of the JWG meeting, Waqar will meet Aiyar to discuss the options of financing the project in the wake of US sanctions against Iran.
With Iran, India and Pakistan showing no sign of backtracking from the proposed project, their first tripartite meeting is expected to take place in New Delhi next month.
“Iran has agreed to participate in the meeting of the Pakistan-India working group on gas pipeline, comprising petroleum secretaries of the two countries, in New Delhi in August,” sources said.
This will be followed by a meeting of oil ministers of the three countries in Tehran by end-November to sign the final deal agreed upon for the pipeline. With the time-frame set for crucial steps to be taken at the diplomatic level, the India-Pakistan JWG will focus on pricing of gas, route of the pipeline, transit fees, equity to finance the project, security of the pipeline and other such details.
The JWG will also deliberate on the risks involved, prevention of supply disruption, dispute resolution and arbitration.
In view of its own increasing gas needs, Pakistan is interested in the early start of work on the project, the sources said. There are reports that if India decides to backtrack from the project, Pakistan will go ahead.
With Aiyar having put in extra work to give a constructive shape to the pipeline, it seems unlikely India will pull out of it. Though India and Iran have been talking about the pipeline project since 1994, prospects of it becoming a reality have gained ground only in the recent past. Earlier hampered by India-Pakistan hostility, the project was viewed more as a mirage. The recent thaw in relations between the two archrivals has made it look like becoming a reality.
As reports of major gas discoveries in India are only of a preliminary nature, they would not affect the project, sources said.
Prospects of this project’s progress rest on the high growth rate of both India and Pakistan. At present, India needs 100 million standard cubic meter of gas per day. Both India and Pakistan have no other option but to further this project as there do not exist any alternative sources to meet their future energy requirements, the sources said.
