Ankara says it is ready to invest $10 billion in Iran, of which $6 billion will be on gas field development and pipeline construction.
Reporting on his Friday visit to Turkey on the sidelines of the cabinet meeting on Sunday, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said that Turkey is interested in the development of Iran’s gas fields and construction of its gas export pipeline to Europe.
The Turkish Energy Minister Hilmi Guler had earlier said that his country was keen to participate in the development of Iran’s South Pars gas field and facilitate export of Iranian gas to Europe via Turkey.
Iran and Turkey signed a memorandum of understanding last year to expand cooperation in the gas sector.
The $70 million purchase by the Turkish fertilizer production firm, Gubre Fabrikalari, of Iran’s state-owned Razi Petrochemical Co. is indicative of foreign firms’ interest in making investments in Iran, Mottaki said, adding that this transaction was in line with Iran’s privatization policy and its plan to attract foreign investment.
Many countries are deeply ambivalent toward the United States’ anti-Iran hostile policies, none more so than Turkey, which imports 90 percent of its energy needs.
Now Ankara is pushing the limits by increasing its natural gas purchases from Iran and considering involvement in developing the world’s largest hydrocarbon reserves.

Pipeline Talks
On July 29 Iranian Petroleum Minister Gholam Hossein Nozari said Turkey and Iran were negotiating over Turkey being a transit corridor for Iranian natural gas exports to Europe and that Iran would provide increased amounts of natural gas to Turkey during the winte
According to Nozari, the pipeline, which would run from Iran’s South Pars natural gas and oil fields to the border province of Bazargan, was discussed during the OPEC summit held on June 22 in Jeddah.
Nozari added, “We have also spoken about the participation of Turkey in the development of phases 14 and 23 of the South Pars field,“ according to Turkish daily Hurriyet.
Phase 14, due to begin production by 2014, is part of a $10 billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, which already has foreign investors--a partnership of NIOC (50 percent), Anglo-Dutch firm Royal Dutch Shell (25 percent), and Spain’s Repsol YPF (25 percent).
Iran currently provides over one-third of Turkey’s domestic demand, while Turkey receives 63.7 percent of its imports from Gazprom with smaller volumes coming from Azerbaijan. In 1996 Turkey signed a contract with Iran for natural gas deliveries, which began in December 2001 via a pipeline from Tabriz to Ankara.
Energy imports from Iran are critical to sustaining Turkish economic growth, even though Washington, whose diplomatic relations are increasingly strained with Russia and non-existent with Iran, is very unhappy about the situation.

No Alternatives
At a time of record high oil prices, when Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah said, “Consumer countries have to adapt to the prices and the mechanisms of the market,“ Washington’s desperate efforts to compel its allies to revere its illegal sanctions against Tehran seem at best naive, especially when the United States has no alternative sources of energy to offer.
While Washington’s threats of sanctions forced both Royal Dutch Shell and Repsol YPF to withdraw from the South Pars development projects (later said they will not do so), there is a major difference between a multinational company and a sovereign government bending to sanctions.
For Turkey, displays of political solidarity must take a back seat for financial considerations, as the government is committed to economic growth to improve the lives of its citizens.
Ankara estimates that from Desert Storm in 1991 until the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, it lost an estimated $80 billion in oil revenues and increased energy costs as a result of supporting US and UN sanctions and policies against Iraq.
Washington can hardly expect Turkey to suffer further financial losses for supporting its Middle East policies. With no end to energy price increases in sight, Washington has no other option but to acknowledge the reality of Turkey’s pragmatic economic relations with its energy-rich eastern neighbor, even if it does not agree with them.

{See Page Domestic Economy)

A video released by an Israeli human rights group has sparked a military investigation into the abuse of a Palestinian civilian by an Israeli soldier.
The video released by B’Tselem this weekend shows a soldier firing a rubber-coated bullet near the foot of a West Bank man whose hands were bound and whose eyes were blindfolded. The man, Ashraf Abu Rahmeh, said on Monday he was lightly hurt by the riot control weapon and treated at the scene, AP reported.
Abu Rahmeh said he was arrested at a peaceful demonstration after Zionist troops imposed a curfew on the town of Naalin in an attempt to quell protests against the illegal West Bank barrier Israel is building nearby.
Soldiers took him to an army jeep and seized his ID card. Then, he said, “They shot me in the foot, in the toe.’’
B’Tselem obtained the videotape from a Palestinian girl who said she filmed the incident from her home on July 7, spokeswoman Sarit Michaeli said.She demanded that the military take steps against the soldier and an officer who is seen holding Abu Rahmeh’s arm when the soldier fired.
In a statement sent to the AP on Monday, the Zionist military called the incident a “stark violation’’ of its rules of conduct and safety, and said military police were investigating.

The Indian government’s peace process with Pakistan is “under stress“ because its nuclear-armed foe was “inciting terror“, the country’s foreign secretary said on Monday.
The statement comes after a deadly bomb attack on the Indian Embassy in Kabul this month and reports of cross-border firing on the line of control between India and Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, AFP reported.
“Unfortunately, certain incidents in the recent past have vitiated the atmosphere between India and Pakistan. The dialogue process is under stress,“ Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon told reporters.
He added that statements made by leaders of Pakistan have incited terror.
“There are such statements from some government officials and this incitement of violence has culminated in suicide blasts in our embassy in Kabul,“ he said. “All investigations point to Pakistan being behind the blast.“
India last week blamed Pakistan’s intelligence service for a suicide car-bomb attack in Kabul that killed 58 people, including two Indian diplomats.
India accuses Pakistan of backing a two-decade-old separatist revolt in Kashmir, which both sides claim in full but rule in part, and trying to hit Indian interests abroad. While ties had been warming since a peace process started in 2004, after the countries nearly went to a fourth war, there has been little progress in their main dispute over Kashmir, and both suspect each other’s involvement in revolts in border areas.
In the last two years, India has suffered bomb attacks by suspected Islamist militants on cities outside Kashmir, including Mumbai, New Delhi, Hyderabad, Varanasi, and in May, Jaipur.
Pakistan has denied a hand in these attacks.