China rail project aims to link Tibet to Kathmandu, may be extended to Indian border

[beijingwalker]

China rail project aims to link Tibet to Kathmandu, may be extended to Indian border​

Published: 29th December 2022 11:29 pm IST

New Delhi: China has sent a team of experts to Nepal to launch a feasibility study for a cross-border railway project dogged for years by technical challenges, political instability in the Himalayan nation and questions over economic feasibility, according to a media report.

When Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Nepal in 2019, he pledged that the 170 km railway route would boost landlocked Nepal’s economy by improving trade and transport connectivity with China, South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported.

There have been speculations that the railway could also be extended from Kathmandu to the Nepalese tourist hub of Pokhara and southern city of Lumbini, near the Indian border, the report said.

Six Chinese experts from the state-owned China Railway First Survey and Design Institute Group arrived in Kathmandu on Tuesday.

They will study the 170 km Trans-Himalayan Tibet-Nepal railway, according to official Chinese media reports.

The project, a part of Beijing’s transnational Belt and Road Initiative, aims to link Gyirong county in southern Tibet to Nepalese capital Kathmandu and has been in the works since 2016, SCMP reported.

Construction for the project was expected to start by 2021, but its fate has been left uncertain by a number of factors, including environmental concerns and regional geopolitics, topped by the Covid-19 pandemic. Nepal sits between geopolitical rivals China and India, and both giant Asian neighbours seek influence over the small Himalayan nation.

Questions over domestic political support in Nepal for the railway were also raised when former prime minister KP Sharma Oli, who backed the project and was seen as favouring stronger ties with China, was ousted – with the more ‘pro-Indian’ Sher Bahadur Deuba taking over the reins last year, SCMP reported.

Deuba was replaced on Monday by Pushpa Kamal Dahal, better known as “Prachanda” or the fearless, a pro-China veteran Maoist leader and two-time prime minister who returned to power in an alliance with Oli’s party.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in August that officials from both sides had agreed to fast track a feasibility study for the construction of the Tibet-Nepal railway.

On August 10, some four months after his own visit to Kathmandu, Wang told visiting Nepalese counterpart Narayan Khadka that China will fund the study.

China rail project aims to link Tibet to Kathmandu, may be extended to Indian border

China has sent a team of experts to Nepal to launch a feasibility study for a cross-border railway project in the Himalayan nation

www.siasat.com

 

[etylo]

Indians dont want the railway connect from China to Nepal and to the india border, Indians will use every trick and every ounce of strength to derail and stop the project undertaking.

 

[beijingwalker]

Indians dont want the railway connect from China to Nepal and to the india border, Indians will use every trick and every ounce of strength to derail and stop the project undertaking.

They had already reached Indian border from the Chinese side

The bullet train travelling through the clouds in the Himalaya mountains

The bullet train travelling through the clouds in the Himalaya mountains By Frankie Youd For the first time in history, individuals visiting Tibet can experience the area’s mountains and views at high speed, via Tibet’s first ever bullet train. Stretching 435km the line connects the capital...

defence.pk

 

[etylo]

They had already reached Indian border from the Chinese side

The bullet train travelling through the clouds in the Himalaya mountains

The bullet train travelling through the clouds in the Himalaya mountains By Frankie Youd For the first time in history, individuals visiting Tibet can experience the area’s mountains and views at high speed, via Tibet’s first ever bullet train. Stretching 435km the line connects the capital...

defence.pk

I mean through Nepal to Indian border. Indians will oppose and try to stop the construction of China-Nepal railway in every possible way, they will put all the pressure on Nepalese not to build the railway, they regard Nepal as in their sphere of control.