The Taliban announced their readiness to form a special security unit for the TAPI project
Taliban Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs Mullah Baradar announced the group's readiness to form a special security unit for the TAPI project in Afghanistan. This was reported by Afghanistan International on Saturday.
Baradar's office focuses on maintaining the political, safe and economic well-being of the region, the newspaper notes.
The statement was made after Moscow showed interest in the gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India (TAPI). "As the situation in Afghanistan stabilizes, domestic economic operators may participate in the construction and operation of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan- Pakistan– India gas pipeline," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement following an earlier visit to Kabul by the special representative of the President of the Russian Federation for Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov.
Security challenges have always been one of the main issues for the implementation of the project in Afghanistan. A few days earlier, the possibility of Russia's participation in the TAPI project was confirmed by the Minister of Energy of the Russian Federation Nikolai Shulginov in an interview with PTV World.
"At the moment we are not involved in this project, but the Russian Federation will participate in this project. Of course, there are various issues that need to be resolved, including security issues [of the transit] through Afghanistan. But I don't see any particular difficulties here, because this issue is being discussed, and we also understand that such security can be ensured," Shulginov said during a visit to Pakistan. The TAPI project involves the construction of a gas pipeline with a capacity of 33 billion cubic meters per year from the Galkynysh field in Turkmenistan through the cities of Herat and Kandahar in Afghanistan and Quetta and Multan in Pakistan to Fazilka in western India. The length of the gas pipeline will be more than 1800 km, including 207 km in Turkmenistan, 774 km in Afghanistan and 826 km in Pakistan to the border with India.
The company developing the project, TAPI Pipeline Company Limited, is 85% owned by the state concern “Turkmengas”. 5% of the consortium's shares are owned by Afghanistan, Inter State Gas Systems (Private) Limited from Pakistan and GAIL from India.
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