U.S. companies need incentive to participate in TAPI project

U.S. companies seek an incentive of Turkmenistan in order to

participate in the TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India)

pipeline project, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South and

Central Asia Robert Blake told reporters during his visit to Central

Asia, Trend reports.

"Many American companies are very interested in participating," he

said adding that the road show will be going to the United States but

also other countries as well.

Blake stressed that progress on this issue depends on what is on offer.

"There are a lot of risks to participating in such a pipeline. Part of

their consideration will be what kind of incentives Turkmenistan will

be prepared to offer international companies to get involved in that

project. We will see when the road show takes place," Blake said.

He said there will be a road show that will take place sometime in

September, at which they will begin to have concrete discussions about

who is going to form and lead this consortium to actually build this

pipeline.

"This is a crucial series of discussions that will take place," Blake said.

The project was supposed to be implemented in the early nineties, when

the operator was the American company Unocal leading an international

consortium. The idea came to naught after the Taliban loudly declared

itself the leader of the major transit country - Afghanistan - where a

significant part of the pipe would be laid.

The Ashgabat interstate agreement of member stated that the practical

implementation of the TAPI project signed in late 2010 is the base

document to promote TAPI project.

Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhammadov at a recent meeting said

that holding road show with the participation of the Asian Development

Bank (ADB) in Singapore, New York, London may attract major investors

to construction of TAPI.