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Iran ‘restarts fuel exports to Afghanistan after messages from Taliban’

Afghan national army soldiers pump fuel at a
Afghan national army soldiers pump fuel at a "class 3" depot in Afghanistan.

Iran reportedly restarted fuel exports to Afghanistan a few days ago following a request from the emerging Taliban government.

The Taliban feel empowered by the US withdrawal from Afghanistan to buy Washington-sanctioned Iran’s oil more openly, Reuters on August 23 reported an Iranian official as saying.

The price of gasoline in Afghanistan reached $900 per tonne as many Afghans drove out of cities, fearing a return to the harsh regime run under Sharia Law that the Sunni Muslim Taliban imposed when they were last in power two decades ago. To counter the price spike, the Taliban, it is said, asked Shi'ite Muslim Iran to keep the borders open for traders.

"The Taliban sent messages to Iran saying 'you can continue the exports of petroleum products'," Hamid Hosseini, board member and spokesperson of Iran's Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Products Exporters' Union, in Tehran, told Reuters.

The Taliban, the news agency added, sent messages both to Iranian traders and to an Iranian chamber of commerce, which has close links to the government. Subsequently, the Islamic Republic of Iran Customs Administration (IRICA) ended a ban on fuel exports to Afghanistan. It was brought in on August 6 because of Iran's anxieties about the safety of trading in the country.

Those concerns have been eased by the Taliban's attitude, Hosseini was also cited as saying.

Since the US under its previous Trump administration brought in a sanction against Tehran that bars fuel exports, Iran has turned to grey and black market petroleum product trading, part of which has involved the trucking of fuel to neighbours including Afghanistan.

Iran’s main exports to Afghanistan are in fact gasoline and gasoil. Iran exported about 400,000 tonnes of fuel to its neighbour from May 2020 to May 2021, according to a report published by PetroView, an Iranian oil and gas research and consultancy platform.

Vital fuel flows

Iranian fuel flows have been vital to Afghanistan in the last few years, according to traders and an Afghan government report, seen by Reuters.

Between March 2020 and March 2021, Iran accounted for $367mn of imports, mostly of fuel, according to the report compiled by the Afghan ministry of finance, chambers of commerce and data from private enterprises.

A source with direct knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be named, told the news service that more than 1mn tonnes per year, or over 20,000 barrels per day, of Iranian fuel goes to Afghanistan.

"I think the new Iranian government will significantly expand cooperation with the Taliban government. Iran can easily double its trade with Afghanistan. The government of [Ashraf] Ghani was always trying to limit cooperation with Iran since Iran was under US sanctions," Hosseini was also quoted as saying.

Afghanistan has no developed oil industry of its own. It is limited to six mini-refineries that produce just several thousand barrels per day of refined products each. They run on light oil from Turkmenistan.