April 15, 2008	Tuesday	Rabi-us-Sani 8, 1429

NEW DELHI, April 14: Senior oil officials from India and Pakistan, led by their ministers, are to hold two days of talks in Islamabad next week on the Turkmenistan gas pipeline proposal, followed by a shorter discussion on the Iranian option, Press Trust of India said on Monday.

Indian Petroleum Minister Murli Deora and his Secretary M. S. Srinivasan will be in Islamabad on April 23 and 24 for the Steering Committee meeting of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan gas pipeline called by the project sponsor Asian Development Bank for a formal induction of New Delhi in the project and signing of heads of agreements, PTI said.

The following day, on April 25, talks with Pakistan would be held on the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project, Mr Deora told journalists on the sidelines of the 5th Asia Gas Partnership Summit here. The talks are aimed at resolving issues such as transit fee that is “impeding progress” on the over 7 billion dollars Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project, “even as it gets formally inducted in a rival line from Turkmenistan,” PTI said.

New Delhi has not been attending talks on the IPI project since mid-2007 as it first wanted to resolve the issue of transit fee payable to Islamabad for wheeling the gas through that country.

Islamabad is seeking 0.493 dollar per million British thermal unit (mBtu) as transit fee, while New Delhi has offered 0.15 dollar per mBtu ($60 million a year) for providing security and right of way to the pipeline.