Ashgabat agreement on regional transport corridor gains real prospects
The official Ashgabat is stepping up its activity in promoting international transport projects. Recently the deputy head of the Turkmen government and the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Rashid Meredov, met with the minister of road transport, roads and cargo transportation Nitin Gadkari during his visit to India. During the talks, opportunities for expanding bilateral cooperation were discussed. In particular, the issue of India's accession to the Ashgabat agreement between Oman, Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan was considered. This multilateral document provides for the creation of an international transport and transit corridor for the creation of a regime favoring the carriage of goods between the states of Central Asia and the countries of the Persian Gulf. Literally on the same days, but already in Ashgabat, a meeting was held on the same issues at the level of deputy ministers of transport of Turkmenistan and Iran. During the meeting, Deputy Minister of Transport and Urban Development of the Islamic Republic of Iran Davud Keshavarzyan stressed the urgency of expanding transport links between Turkmenistan and Iran, taking into account the Ashgabat agreement on multimodal transport. The closest neighbor of the participants in abovementioned and other talks - Pakistan, too, can contribute to the expansion and strengthening of regional cooperation in the transport sector. Orient already reported on the outcome of the meeting of the Turkmen-Pakistani intergovernmental commission that took place recently in Ashgabat. One of the cornerstones of the TPC meeting was the decision of the official Islamabad to join the Central Asia-Middle East (also: CA-Persian Gulf) transport corridor, as well as the perspective transit-transport corridor Central Asia-Caucasus (Afghanistan-Turkmenistan-Azerbaijan-Georgia- Turkey). The "Agreement" mentioned was signed in the Turkmen capital six years ago. Initially, its participants were Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Iran and Oman. The agreement is aimed at creating a transit-transport corridor that will ensure safe mutual cargo transportation between the countries of Central Asia and the Persian Gulf. In 2015, Kazakhstan joined the Ashgabat agreement, and India, whose government last year approved this decision, is also preparing to join the group of countries. Thus, a powerful transport and logistics hub, capable of making two parts of the Eurasian continent closer to a certain extent, is slowly but surely being built in the region. And given the access to the ocean through the ports of Iran, Oman and Pakistan, this transport cluster is capable of much more.
