Afghanistan: Oil & Gas Deals!Afghanistan: Oil & Gas Deals!Foreign oil giants battle for rights to Afghan gas pipeline by Terence White KABUL, Mar 27, 1997 (AFP) - Two foreign oil giants are battling forthe rights to build a natural gas pipline across war-torn Afghanistan,according to Taliban officials in Kabul Thursday."We would like to sign an agreement with any oil company which can start workimmediately," Maulavi Ahmad Jan, acting Minister for Mines and Light Industrytold journalists.He said that the Taliban had held talks with both Bridas, an Argentinian-headedoil and gas corporation, and Unocal Corporation from the United States, whichis teamed up with the Saudi-based company Delta Oil.Bridas and Unocal are in competition to build a multi-billion US dollarpipeline to carry natural gas from the lucrative Turkmenistan deposits toPakistan and India, via western and southern Afghanistan.Ahmad Jan said Afghanistan urgently needed to rebuild is economy, shatteredafter 18 years of war, and that the Taliban were prepared to work with eitherBridas or Unocal for the benefit of the country."It (the pipeline) depends on them - whoever can start their work first,"  themines minister stated.Last Tuesday, the Bridas team flew to the Taliban headquarters in the southerncapital Kandahar for talks with the ruling council there, and later visitedGhazni province south of Kabul. He said a three-man delegation from Bridaswhich had been in Afghanistan for the past two days left Kabul in their privateaircraft Wednesday night for the Kazakhstan capital Almaty. Ahmad Jan said thatBridas took ore samples from Qarabagh district centre in Ghazni, which iswell-known for its natural reserves of oil and  gas reserves."There is fuel in the area, it seeps up from underground to the surface,"  saidAhmad Jan.Rivalry between Bridas and Unocal is apparently intense -- Ahmad Jab said bothoil corporations had signed agreements with the Taliban concerning the gaspipeline but they had not agreed on any joint venture.The immensely rich Yashlar gas fields of Turkmenistan are expected to provideup to 20 billion cubic metres (700 billion cubic feet) of natural  gas per yearto Pakistan and India - if the four-foot (120 centimeter) diameter, 1,300kilometre (800-mile) long pipeline can be built."Bridas will send two groups of technicians to survey the area in a few weeks,"the minister of mines and light industry said.The proposed pipeline would enter Afghanistan at its northwest corner near thecity of Herat, and stretch southwards through the desert past the southernTaliban stronghold city of Kandahar into Pakistan.He added that a delegation from Unocal had just arrived in Islamabad, Pakistan,but was not sure if the American oil giant had plans to visit Kabul.Taliban are still at war with opposition groups in the north of the country.Intense fighting near the northwestern Badghis provincial capital of Qala-i-Nawcould easily spill over into neighbouring Herat province, through which theprojected pipeline is expected to be built.Afghan analysts have said that the proposed pipeline route from Herat toKandahar follows the same road that opposition forces would travel if theymounted a successful offensive against the Taliban.They added that the Western oil giants are fighting a battle for commercialsupremecy over an objective that itself is vulnerable to continued factionalfighting in southern Afghanistan.