Azernews.Az

By Nigar Abbasova

The Islamic Republic of Iran, one of the major participants of the ambitious North-South transport corridor project, offers to create a new transport company, which will be engaged in the provision of necessary coordination along the route of the project.

Vice President of Iranian Railways Company Hossein Ashuri said that his country has several proposals on the provision of stable operation of the corridor.

Speaking at the international rail business forum - “Strategic Partnership 1520: The Caspian Region - connecting four corners of the world”, on November 25, he said that it is necessary to promote the route in Europe, Asia and Africa.

“We offer to create a company, which will bear responsibility for the corridor, and establish branches of the company in participating countries to provide necessary coordination. Also, it is important to take certain measures to facilitate customs formalities and set competitive and flexible tariffs. Moreover, we offer to use a single waybill to accelerate freight traffic.”

The country intends to complete the construction of Qazvin-Rasht, the 164 kilometers long railway in northern Iran, by March 2017.

The under-construction railroad is a part of the North-South transport corridor which connects Northern Europe with Southeast Asia through Iran and Azerbaijan. The project is notable for its benefits not only for development of the economies of the two countries involved, but also for other countries, located along the railway route and the region as a whole.

At the initial stage, it is planned to transport 5 million tons of cargo via the North-South corridor per year and to increase the figure to over 10 million tons in the future.

As for the Rasht-Astara section, Ashuri said that the talks are currently underway with Azerbaijan on the financing and construction of the section.

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Nigar Abbasova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @nigyar_abbasova

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