The oil ministers of Iraq,
Iran and Syria Monday
signed a preliminary agreement for a $10 billion natural gas pipeline
deal, the official Iranian News Agency IRNA and other Iranian media reported.
The document was inked in the Assalouyeh industrial region located in the
southern province of Bushehr by Iranian oil minister Mohammad Aliabadi, Iraq's
oil minister Abdul Kareem Luaiby, and Syrian counterpart Sufian Alow, the
agency said.
Iraqi oil officials confirmed that Luaiby was in Iran to sign the agreement.
They gave no further details.
Iranian oil officials said Syria would purchase between 20 million to 25
million cubic meters a day of Iranian gas. Iraq has already signed a deal with
Tehran to purchase up to 25 million cubic meters a day to feed its power
stations.
The project requires some $10 billion investment and will be constructed within
three years, the semi-official Iranian news agency Mehr reported.
The pipeline
length is more than 1,500 kilometers from Assalouyeh to Damascus passing
through Iraq, with a transfer capacity of 110 million cubic meters of natural
gas a day, it said.
The gas will be produced from the Iranian South Pars gas field in the Gulf,
shared with Qatar, with estimated reserves of 16 trillion cubic meters of
recoverable gas.
Iranian officials have said Iran is producing some 600 million cubic meters of
gas a day, of which only 37 million cubic meters are exported. Tehran also aims
to extend the pipeline
to Lebanon and the Mediterranean to supply gas to Europe, they said.
Iran has been approaching its allies in the region such as Iraq and Syria to
export its gas after western firms have pulled out of Iran's lucrative energy
sector because of international dispute over Tehran's nuclear program which the
west and the U.S. suspect is aimed at producing nuclear bombs.