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28 April 2015

INDIA MAKES SMART MOVE IN CENTRAL ASIA – ANALYSIS


By Divya Kumar Soti

India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj was on a three-day visit to Turkmenistan from March 7 to discuss various bilateral issues like the TAPI pipeline project as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is slated to visit the country in July. Sushma Swaraj described her visit as successful “exceeding her expectations”. Both countries reaffirmed their strong commitment to the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) project and need to expedite the same. Both nations also agreed on sorting out various technical glitches, which include appointment of a consortium leader for the TAPI project, as none of the four partner nations have experience in handling a cross-country pipeline project.

The TAPI pipeline has been stuck up inThis was preceded by a meeting in Islamabad of representative ministers from all the four partner countries in February, chaired by Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif where he described the TAPI project as “very important for all countries of the region” and appealed to all the four nations to “take this opportunity seriously so that we can fulfill our obligation to our people”. Pakistan has faced a great scarcity of gas this winter and the Nawaz government has been facing a lot of criticism at home in the wake of Pakistan’s worsening energy crisis.

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