Forward movement on the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project has failed to enhance the UPA government's comfort level with the Left parties even though they have welcomed it. "It is a positive step in the right direction. We appreciate the talks India had with Iran on Sunday. The government should now go ahead and sign the IPI deal,' CPM politburo member M K Pandhe told TOI. But he also made it clear that progress on the pipeline project would not in any way affect its stand on the Indo-US nuclear deal, which "remained non-negotiable'. On Sunday, petroleum minister Murli Deora met his Iranian counterpart Gholam Hosein Nozari on the sidelines of a meeting of world oil producers and consumers in Jeddah. The two sides agreed for a trilateral meet in Tehran next month to work out details of the $7.4 billion 2,775-km pipeline project. "Most of the bilateral issues have been resolved... a trilateral meeting of oil ministers of the three countries is most likely to take place in Tehran next month,' petroleum secretary M S Srinivasan, who was present at the Jeddah meeting, said on Monday. The Left parties recently attacked the government for "dragging its feet' on the project, conceptualized way back in 1989. They have been backing the IPI project as an essential measure that India must take to meet its energy needs. "Energy security lies in using indigenous energy resources such as coal and ensuring our future energy supplies from Iran and other countries in west and central Asia,' the CPM had said on Saturday. "Obviously, augmenting indigenous coal production, investing in oil exploration, securing gas supplies through Iran gas pipeline are much more important for India's energy security than buying imported reactors,' it said.