Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec. 22 / Trend V. Zhavoronkova, T. Jafarov /
Iran and Tajikistan are negotiating on the possible energy exchange, director of the Trans-Boundary Rivers and Shared Water Resources Bureau under the Iranian Ministry of Energy Jabbar Vatanfada said.
"At present, the issue of energy resource exchange is on the agenda of not only Iran and Tajikistan, but Iran and other countries that could benefit from these projects," he told Trend over phone.
He said that in case of making a final decision on this issue, it will be officially made public.
Vatanfada stressed that Iran's policy of exchanging energy and other resources expands the cooperation in this field and avoids tensions in this regard.
"We are cooperating in energy exchange with all neighboring countries, not only with Tajikistan, to meet common needs," he said.
He added that water and oil are peculiar sources of energy. At present, Iran is exchanging them with such countries as Turkey, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, Iraq.
"The official negotiations on this issue were held between our countries upon Tajikistan's proposal," he said. "The talks aimed at importing water from Tajikistan to Iran and exporting oil or gas from Iran to Tajikistan."
He said that these issues must be considered from technical, political and economic points of view, which should be taken into account.
Only after these issues are well considered, one can start implementing the similar projects, he said.
He stressed that there are different variants of this project implementation. Finally, an advantage will be given to the project, which will be able to bring maximum benefit to all its members.
One of these variants is to transport the resources through Afghanistan, as there is a need for water and energy in some parts of the country, he said.
"If Afghanistan and Tajikistan are seriously interested in the project, its implementation can enhance the security of the whole region," he said.
