Parliament endorses TAPI pact

KABUL.

The lower house also called for the ratification of international conventions prohibiting the use and manufacture of cluster bombs.

Called as TAPI, the pipeline accord was reached among Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India in 2010 in Ashgabat, the capital of Turkmenistan.

Under the project, Afghanistan will earn $200 million per annum in transit fee, the deputy head of the parliament’s international affairs commission, Mohammad Noor Akbari, told the house.

Work on the gas line will start in 2012 and the countries involved will start taking benefit from the project in 1214, he said.

Akbari said the project would provide work opportunities to 8,000 Afghans, besides producing 2,500 mega watts of electricity.

As part of the agreement, he said, Afghanistan will use about 1.2 billion cubic metre in the provinces the pipeline crosses inside the country.

Sponsored by the Asian Development Bank, the TAPI was first conceived in the 1990s, but is only now making inroads towards development due to years of conflict in Afghanistan.

Akbari did not provide details about the conventions prohibiting the use of cluster bombs, but said there was a detailed debate on the convention.

Of 130 MPs present, 128 raised green cards in favour of banning the use of cluster bombs in the country.

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