An Afghan delegation visiting Turkmenistan has reached an agreement on important issues related to the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline, according to the Afghan Foreign Ministry.

Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Shafai Azam said the two sides had agreed on an action plan to build a gas pipeline, distribute gas to the Herat industrial park and residents, and convert gas to liquefied natural gas.

Afghanistan's Ministry of Economic Development also spoke out about TAPI. "The TAPI program is one of the important and fundamental programs that can promote political interaction, regional cooperation and regional development," ministry spokesman Abdul Rahman Habib said.

In recent years, the TAPI gas pipeline project to bring Turkmen gas to Afghanistan and South Asian countries has become more urgent. This is due to the difficult situation in the global oil and gas market ahead of winter.

The state of the LNG market suggests that pipeline gas supplies under long-term contracts are most beneficial to developing Asia. This is also the energy Turkmenistan exports to its South Asian partners, which will be supplied by the TAPI gas pipeline if it is successfully laid.

The TAPI gas pipeline starts from the Dowretabad gas field in eastern Turkmenistan, passes through Afghanistan and Pakistan to Fazirgah, a small Indian town on the India-Pakistan border. The total length of the TAPI gas pipeline is 1,814 kilometers, 214 kilometers in Turkmenistan and about 800 kilometers in Afghanistan. With an annual capacity of 33 billion cubic meters of gas, Turkmenistan will be able to ship gas to Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.

The project started in Turkmenistan at the end of 2015, and a groundbreaking ceremony was held in Afghanistan in February 2018. The project was put on hold with the recent instability in Afghanistan. Editor/Xu Shengpeng