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Fuel-hungry India will receive gas from energy-rich Iran via a multi-billion-dollar pipeline through Pakistan in four years, said an Iranian oil official in New Delhi. "The gas supply will start in 2011," said Ghanimi Fard, the Iranian Oil Ministry's special representative, according to a report on Saturday in India's Business Standard paper.
"Almost 18 percent of the physical work on the pipeline in Iran has been completed since last year." Ghanimi Fard made the comments to reporters after talks that wrapped up on Friday with Indian Oil Minister Murli Deora and Pakistan Petroleum Secretary Ahmad Waqar to finalise details for the 7.4 billion-dollar pipeline.
Discussions on the proposal started in 1994, but have been stalled because of technical and commercial issues. There have also been strong objections to the pipeline from the United States, which has locked horns with Tehran over its atomic programme.
"We are confident of resolving all issues by next month," said Indian Petroleum Secretary M.S. Srinivasan. India and Pakistan agreed in February to pay Iran 4.93 dollars per million British thermal units for its gas. But issues such as how often pricing should be revised - Iran now wants this to happen every three years instead of the previously agreed seven years - remain to be decided.
"If Iran's proposed gas price after three years was not acceptable to us, we will not be able to do much," an Indian official, who was not identified, told the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency. "We will not even be able to walk out of the project as over four billion dollars would have already been invested."
In Murli Deora said earlier that the final framework would be announced by the three countries' oil ministers in late July, but Iran's request for more frequent pricing revision may push back the final deal by two months, the PTI said. The 2,600-km pipeline from Iran's giant South Pars gas field will initially carry around 60 million standard cubic meters per day of gas.
India, which imports more than 70 percent of its energy needs, has been racing to secure new supplies of oil and gas from abroad besides ramping up production from domestic sources to sustain its scorching economic growth.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2007

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