TEHRAN and Baghdad have not started their negotiation over signing a second gas export contract.

The managing director of National Iranian Gas Company Hamidreza Araqi says that the proposed route for the second deal is to transfer Iranian gas to the Iraqi city of Basra.

“But we haven’t signed any contract yet,” he says.

Iran will start exporting gas to Baghdad by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2015), he explains.

Iran’s Deputy Oil Minister Ali Majedi says that Iran will start exporting gas to Iraq once the two sides complete their share of the gas pipeline.

“The construction operation will be completed next Iranian calendar year (to start on March 21, 2015),” he says.

“The two sides are working hard to construct the pipeline as soon as possible,” Iran’s deputy oil minister explains. “Based on the signed contract, Iran and Iraq can postpone the starting day of gas exports to next year,” Majedi says. Iran has completed 80 per cent of the pipeline on its soil,” he says.

“Iran has agreed to export 40 million cubic metres of gas to Iraq,” he adds. Once the deal becomes operational, Baghdad will become Tehran’s main gas buyer, overtaking Ankara’s place.

Majedi says that the signed contract was valid for four years, but based on the agreement reached between the two countries’ ministers the contract have been extended to ten years.

Iranian Deputy Oil Minister Hamidreza Araqi says that based on an agreement with Iraq, Tehran will start exporting gas to Baghdad in summer.

Previously it was announced that Iran will start exporting gas to Iraq in spring.

“Iran will start exporting gas to Iraq limitedly with 3 or 4 million cubic metres per day,” Araqi says. He went on to note that Iran will implement the deal in 3 phases.

“Transition to the second phase will take some time because some 300 kilometres of pipeline needs to be laid, “he explains.

Once the pipeline is ready, Tehran will start exporting 7 million cubic metres of gas per day to Baghdad.

The figure will reach 40 million cubic metres in the first phase. It is while Iran was supposed to export only 25 million cubic metres of gas per day to its southwestern neighbour in the first phase.

Iranian gas is expected to account for 30-35 per cent and 65-70 per cent of Iraqi households and power plants’ gas consumption, respectively.

The managing director of National Iranian Gas Exports Company Alireza Kameli says that Iraq has requested to increase its gas imports from Iran up to 90 million cubic metres per day.

“The two sides have agreed to increase the volume of Iran’s gas exports to Baghdad to 40 million cubic metres from the current 25 million,” he says.

Kameli went on to note that Iran will start with exporting 25 million cubic metres of gas in 2014 and will increase the figure to 40 million cubic metres in 2015.

“The two sides have also agreed to extend the deal for ten years,” he says.

The deal was previously valid for four years. Iran will also export 50 million cubic metres of gas to Iraqi city of Basra.

Iran plans to construct two pipelines to export gas to Iraqi cities of Baghdad and Basra.

Iran’s sixth cross-country gas pipeline will feed the mentioned two pipelines.