WASHINGTON, March 24: The United States wants India and Pakistan to build a gas pipeline but instead of Iran it should come from Turkmenistan, says an influential Indo-American newspaper. Quoting diplomatic sources, the India Abroad newspaper reports in its latest issue that the US had conveyed its desire for the construction of this new gas pipeline to India even before Secretary of State visited New Delhi last week and publicly acknowledged that Washington did not want India to buy gas from Iran. The influential weekly newspaper says the pipeline Washington wants built will come from Turkmenistan -– through Afghanistan and Pakistan -– to India. The report says that the US was initially quiet on India’s efforts to buy gas from Iran because it wanted to remove New Delhi’s objections to a pipeline through Pakistan and once this was achieved, Washington began to push the alternative project, the Turkmenistan pipeline.

“The Americans waited until the (Indian) cabinet decided to explore the possibility of the Iran project — which signalled that India was open to a pipeline through Pakistan — before registering their objections and reservations to the deal.”

The newspaper notes that with the US decision to push the Turkmenistan pipeline, “the Great Game for tapping the Central Asian oil and gas reserves has begun in right earnest once again.”

The first salvo in this game was fired by the US Ambassador to India, David Mulford, who ‘gently’ warned the Indians that the US will not look too kindly upon the gas pipeline from Iran. This was followed by the message delivered by Secretary Rice who expressed her reservations over the possibility of a pipeline from Iran.