June 7, 2005	Tuesday	Rabi-us-Sani 29, 1426

ISLAMABAD, June 6: Islamabad and New Delhi on Monday formed a joint working group to get the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project “off the ground” early next year.

Indian Oil Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said at a press conference after a meeting with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz that the group would initiate interaction between officials and technical, financial and legal experts of the two countries to take the project to the implementation stage by early next year.

In reply to a question, he said the three sides would think over the formation of a trilateral steering committee.

There was no difference in the strategies of Pakistan, India and Iran regarding the pipeline, he said.

He said the India-Iran joint group had held six technical and three ministerial meetings over the past six months and the Pakistan-India group would also organize as many meetings in the next six months. He said the Pakistan-India group would start functioning next month.

Mr Aiyar said he had invited his Pakistani counterpart Amanullah Khan Jadoon to visit India by the end of August and he would return here in October or November to take the dialogue process forward.

He said Pakistan had also invited Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh.

In reply to a question, he said Pakistan had not taken up the matter of including China in the project but there were no technical hurdles in this regard. He said any country could become part of any project in the process of contacts of South Asia with West, East and Central Asia in the hydrocarbon sector.

He said the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan pipeline could be expanded to include India and Uzbekistan.

He said he had requested Pakistan to invite him through the Asian Development Bank in the next meeting of the steering committee on the project in Turkmenistan.

He rejected an impression that the United States was pressing Pakistan and India to focus on the Turkmenistan pipeline instead of the one from Iran because of its deteriorated diplomatic relations with Tehran.

He said there was no pressure and both the countries would take a decision which was in their best interests and in accordance with their future energy requirements.

He said the available technical information showed that both the projects were feasible but there was need to know whether there were enough reserves in the Turkmenistan gas fields.

He said Pakistan had assured India of providing best security to the pipeline and New Delhi trusted Islamabad’s sincerity on the issue.

Mr Aiyar said there would be no hurdles in getting financial assistance for the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline. He said Pakistan and India were economically sound now and international donors would never hesitate in investing in projects from which they could get returns.

He said both the countries needed to meet their future energy demands to sustain their current growth rates.

Terming his meeting with Mr Aziz ‘historic’, Mr Aiyar said he shared the view of the prime minister that the project should be implemented according to the best international practices.

Jawed Naqvi adds from New Delhi: The official Indian account of Petroleum Minister Aiyar’s talks in Pakistan indicated that the various proposed sources of piped gas to India through Pakistan were additions rather than alternatives to the Iranian project.

An official Indian statement quoted Mr Aiyar as saying that India was keen that the pipeline project got off the ground by the end of the current year.

The two petroleum ministers are expected to exchange visits in the next six months to review the progress made by the joint working group.

The statement quoted Mr Aiyar as saying in Islamabad that the group would “intensify interaction between the two countries regarding the technical, commercial, legal and other related aspects with regard to the proposed gas pipeline project from Iran through Pakistan to India.” A joint communique on the talks is expected on Tuesday.

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