خبر ها - بازرگانی

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his Turkmen Counterpart Gurbanguly Berdimuhammadov discussed gas pipeline project on Thursday, Turkmen government said.

In a meeting, the leaders talked about cooperation in fuel and energy sector, and specifically - implementation of the project of construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI), it said.

The sides stressed that "implementation of this large-scale energy project is important for all parties involved, and, above all, for Afghanistan, and will directly help to stimulate the Afghan economy, attract investment, address urgent social issues, including employment, which will positively affect stabilisation of the situation in the country as a whole," it added.

The TAPI project was launched in December 2010 in Ashgabat, where important agreements were concluded following the high level summit.

The length of the TAPI may hit over 17,000 km. The design capacity is about 33 billion cubic meters of gas per year, while the cost is estimated at $7-8 billion.

Power sector is among the priority issues.

Turkmenistan has made efficient efforts to increase electricity supply to Afghanistan.

The gas pipeline known as "TAPI" can transfer 33 billion cubic meters of gas each year. Its length will be 1,800km and starting from Turkmenistan going through Kandahar and Chaman to Pakistan and India.

The practical phase of the project will start by 2014.