Iran Daily: A Blow to Sanctions

Iran, Pakistan and India will sign a deal this month to build a natural gas pipeline to help feed the subcontinent’s desperate need for energy, indeed a major blow to illegal US-led sanctions against Tehran and a defeat for US influence in South Asia.
The $7.5 billion “Peace Pipeline“ (IPI) project would bring gas from the South Pars gas fields through Balochistan (in Western Pakistan) into India. The project has stalled multiple times since first proposed in 1994 due to political tensions, changing governments, conflicts over prices, and most recently, the weight of American opposition.
However, the new agreement comes amid growing tension between the United States and Iran, which the US has sought to isolate from the world community with little or no results.
Rising fuel prices and a soaring Indian economy seem to have outweighed America’s desires--as well as a rival plan for a US-backed pipeline from Turkmenistan.
Though Iran and Pakistan finalized a deal earlier this spring, India remained noncommittal. IPI advocates say the reluctance was due to American pressure: The 2006 US-India nuclear agreement puts pressure upon India to cooperate with American foreign policy goals, and bolstering the Iranian economy through oil imports is hardly on Washington’s to-do list......Article continues