Country started Russian oil purchases this year and welcomes Moscow’s participation in long-discussed TAPI pipeline
Оригинальный текст опубликован на сайте «Upstream», 22 November 2023 13:22 GMT . Автор: Материал доступен по .
Pakistan will seek higher imports of Russian natural gas and crude oil at a discount on the global market price to help answer its rising energy demand, according to its recently appointed ambassador to Moscow.
In his first interview since taking the diplomatic post, Muhammad Khalid Jamali told Russian state-run news agency Tass that Pakistan will initially aim to meet 10% of the country’s energy demand with Russian supplies of oil and gas.
“In the future, the volume [of Russian hydrocarbon imports] may rise to 30% of the total consumption”, Jamali said.
“It is not in Pakistan’s economic interest to join anti-Russian sanctions as our bilateral trade is growing. Pakistan’s imports from Russia have increased by 154% this year compared to the previous year, which is a remarkable figure”, he said.
In June this year, Pakistan imported a first cargo of Russian oil of about 733,000 barrels that was sent to a processing plant operated by Pakistan Refinery Limited after being unloaded in the port of Karachi.
Moscow-based business daily Kommersant reported earlier this month that Russian oil supplies to Pakistan are handled by the country’s fourth largest oil producer, Surgutneftegaz.
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According to the report, Surgutneftegaz has loaded a third marine cargo of similar size in the Baltic port of Ust-Luga to sail to Karachi earlier in November.
Surgutneftegaz is one of the least transparent Russian oil producers, its true owners hidden behind a veil of affiliated companies and pension funds.
The company has accumulated an estimated $35 billion in cash and equivalents over two decades.
Jamali said Pakistan welcomes possible Russian participation in the long-discussed but stalled TAPI pipeline project to build a gas export line from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan and Pakistan to the Indian border.
“We have no objections to Russia’s participation in TAPI in any form in which it might participate. We have no problem with this and would like to welcome everything that brings prosperity to our country and the entire region as a whole,” Jamali said.
In its original configuration without the Russian involvement, TAPI was planned to carry up to 33 billion cubic metres per annum of Turkmenistan gas over a total distance of about 1800 kilometres. Some 13.8 Bcm of that gas was expected to be consumed in Pakistan.
Russia’s interest in TAPI pipeline surfaced earlier this year as Moscow increased its efforts to identify alternative gas markets after its exports to Europe largely dried up.
Russian state-controlled gas giant Gazprom said in October that it will make large-scale upgrades to reverse the flow of gas in a network of gas pipelines built in the Soviet era to deliver gas from Central Asia to Russia.
Known as the Central Asia–Centre trunkline, the system could carry Russian gas from West Siberia to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan once upgrades are finished.
Last week, Pakistani news outlet Business Recorder quoted TAPI Pipeline Company chief executive and Turkmen national Muhammetmyrat Amanov as saying that Turkmenistan has approached the US for consultations.
Turkmenistan is reportedly seeking the partial relaxation of US sanctions on Afghanistan to allow the Taliban government to raise the necessary financing to build the country’s segment of TAPI.
Authorities in Ashgabat repeatedly said that they already built their own 200-kilometre segment of the TAPI pipeline to the country’s border with Afghanistan using large-diametre pipes manufactured in Russia.