India seems to hold the upper-hand over Iran in a dispute over payments for crude oil shipments that has been rumbling for over six months.
Iran supplies India with 12-14 per cent of its total imports, making it India’s second biggest provider after Saudi Arabia. But a payments dispute has left India owing debts estimated at anywhere between $2-6 billion. In effect, this means India has been importing Iranian oil on credit since December 2010.
Pakistan is to become a key buyer of Iranian natural gas at a time when relations with Washington are at their most strained in recent years.
Work on extending the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline will begin in the next six months and is set to be complete by 2014, according to Asim Hussain, the Pakistani natural resources minister. Some 1,100 km of the 2,700 km pipeline has already been completed on the Iranian side of the border, stretching from the South Pars field to the frontier with Pakistan.
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