China joins the Pakistan-Iran-Turkey Railway Project

[Omar1984]

Pakistan Mulling Extension of ECO Railway to China
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TEHRAN (FNA)- Pakistani Minister of Railways Haji Ghulam Ahmed Bilour on Monday announced that the country is mulling the possibility for linking Islamabad-Tehran-Istanbul railway to China.

"After the success of ECO (Economic Cooperation Organization) train, Islamabad is studying the railway between Pakistan-China," Bilour told FNA.

He also reiterated that Islamabad has assigned a consortium to examine the railway project between Pakistan and China.

Bilour highlighted that Islamabad and Beijing intend to start the project with a freight train in the first stage and they would consider operation of a business class passenger train at a later stage.

The first Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) freight started its operation from Islamabad on 14 August, Pakistan's National Day.

The 6,500-kilometer railroad is among ECO's major projects. 1,900 km out of the 6,506 km-long railway passes through Pakistan, 2,570 km through Iran and the remaining 2,036 km passes through Turkey.

The concept of such a train was proposed at the 18th Regional Planning Council of the ECO held in March 2008 in Islamabad.

The regular service of the train is expected to begin next year.

The ultimate aim of the project is to start a regular passenger train service between ECO member states and provide a link to Europe and Central Asia.

Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are member states of the ECO.

 

[Developereo]

This is great news.

Pakistan should focus BIG TIME on building up the ECO relationship.

Maybe the Gwadar-China rail link can also become reality one day.
http://www.defence.pk/forums/econom...-seeks-rail-network-china-gwadar-karachi.html

 

[Spring Onion]

Ah good things coming up. great news.

 

[Comet]

This is extremely good news. China can only get maximum from Gawadar if there is rail link from China to Gawadar. Transport from road cost a lot more than transporting good via train.

 

[xukxuk]

i can imaging in the future Gwadar ganna be one of the biggest city in that region

 

[Omar1984]

All 4 countries: Pakistan, China, Iran, and Turkey will benefit a lot from this railway. This was one of the greatest ideas Pakistan ever came up with. Connecting Pakistan to Europe, Middle East, Central Asia, as well as our best friend China through railway.

P.S. Pakistan and China are also working on a railway track to Afghanistan.

Pakistan's strategic location is just as valuable as oil is to the Saudis.

 

[naseebkhanniazi]

i think this news is good but lot of things are discus able