KABUL - A meeting was held with a delegation from the Afghan Ministry of Mines at the Turkmen Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources to discuss the implementation of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) construction project, a Turkmenistan newspaper has reported.

Confirming the need for rapid implementation of the TAPI project, the parties agreed on a number of economic and technical issues associated with laying out a transnational power line through the territory of neighbouring countries.

According to the project feasibility study, the 1,735-kilometre TAPI gas pipeline will have a capacity of 33 billion cubic metres of natural gas per year from the Dauletabad field in Turkmenistan, one of the world's largest. Passing through the territory of Afghanistan and Pakistan, the pipeline will reach the Fazilka settlement in India, along the Pakistan-Indian border. The main provisions of a number of intergovernmental documents were also specified within the meeting.

The TAPI project is seen as a rival to plans from Iran through its so-called Peace Pipeline. TAPI is favoured by the West over the Tehran's pipeline project. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, during a July visit to India, called on Asian countries to work together to "create a new Silk Road" of transnational networks of economic and transit connections.

"That means building more rail lines, highways, energy infrastructure, like the proposed pipeline to run from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan, through Pakistan into India," she said. (Agencies)