Gwadar port city development project | News and Updates

[oct605032048]

coastal highway has been completed? good.

 

[Hyde]

coastal highway has been completed? good.

Makran coastal high was completed 6-7 years ago

Even the motorway has already been built. I guess 90 - 95% of the motorway has been completed between Sindh and Balochistan. Hopefully soon all 4 provinces will be connected with each other through motorways.

 

[ice_man]

bloody ethnic divisions done by our leaders have stopped vital growth projects in pakistan such as kalabagh & gawadar!!!! seems its easy to divide pakistanis on many issues!!

gawadar port should have been completed and operationa way before but foreign hands....from middle east countries have slowed the project inorder to ensure there ports remain "NUMBER1"!!!

 

[Elusive]

Could anybody here,post how much Gawadar port will earn for pakistan in year after it will get operational???

 

[alibaz]

Self deleted

 

[alibaz]

Self deleted

 

[alibaz]

Could anybody here,post how much Gawadar port will earn for pakistan in year after it will get operational???

It will not earn any thing till the time no air/rail and good road route will be made available. The airport which we have, only supports ATR flights and only good available road route is coastal highway between Gawadar and Karachi , ironically so far no rail link. So what is so attractive for any businessman to get his goods off loaded at Gawadar and then takes back to Karachi and then to rest of the country. I think government has to give it a very serious thought cause its already very late.

 

[Elusive]

I heard 2 years back,shara-e-reshum will be connected with gawadar in the assistance of china..was that truth??

 

[Omar1984]

Gwadar, Pakistan — the most important city you’ve never heard of


Gwadar, Pakistan — the most important city you’ve never heard of - NYPOST.com


The world’s “busiest and most important interstate,” journalist Robert D. Kaplan says, is the Indian Ocean, with 50% of all container traffi c and 70% of all petroleum traffic traversing its waters. It is this region — with China and India jockeying for dominance, the United States trying to maintain its infl uence and unstable regimes threatening the fl ow of resources — that will be the setting for most of the global confl icts in the coming decades.

In his new book, “Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power” (Random House), Kaplan notes that US leaders already realize this, with the Navy suggesting that it will not have a forward operating presence in the Atlantic, shifting to this area instead. But the battle for the Indian Ocean will not be like the conflicts of the past. China, for instance, will not be a straightforward foe like the Soviet Union.

“The real lesson here is the subtlety of the world we’re entering, of which the Indian Ocean provides a salient demonstration,” Kaplan says. “Instead of the hardened military bases of the Cold War and earlier epochs, there will be dual-use civilian-military facilities where basing arrangements will be implicit rather than explicit.” Here, Kaplan runs down the region, including the little-known city that could loom large


Gwadar

At the intersection of empires, the port city of Gwadar “could become the new silk route nexus,” Kaplan says, but that’s all tied to Pakistan’s struggle against becoming a failed state. The Middle Eastern nation of Oman held Gwadar until 1958, when it was ceded to the newly formed Pakistan. Russia coveted it as a port during its long war in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, two local ethnic groups, the Baluch and the Sindhi, battle for their own independent nations. Now the Chinese are funding a sophisticated, deepwater port in Gwadar. China also is constructing the Karakoram Highway, which connects the city to China through Pakistan. “Come back in a decade nd this place will look like Dubai,” a developer says. Or it could explode in ethnic violence, Kaplan says. “Gwadar is the litmus test; it is an indication of the stability of the whole Arabian Sea region.”



Afghanistan

Pipelines from Turkemenistan and other countries need to pass through Afghanistan to carry natural gas and oil to the coast. “Stabilizing Afghanistan is about much more than just the anti-terrorist war,” Kaplan says. “It is about securing the future prosperity of the whole of southern Eurasia, as well as easing India and Pakistan towards peaceful coexistence through the sharing of energy routes.”



China

By 2015, China will be the world’s most prolific shipbuilder, and Shanghai already is the world’s busiest port. Like the US, China sees itself as a benign power. It does not look to occupy other nations (besides Taiwan), but wants to protect its interests and extend its influence. Kaplan believe we will both “compete and cooperate” with them.

Taiwan

“An unsinkable aircraft carrier,” Gen. Douglas MacArthur called it. Kaplan likens China’s quest for the island to the Indian wars in the US; once they were resolved, America could look abroad. If China can consolidate Taiwan, “it would be the real emergence of a multipolar world.”

India

Soon to be fourth-largest energy consumer after the US, China and Japan, India will remain non-aligned, Kaplan says, but leaning more toward the US. Its answer to the Chinese port at Gwadar was an $8 billion naval base at Karwar. It will hold 42 ships, including submarines.



US fleet

At end of WWII, US had 6,700 ships; Cold War, 600. It’s now fewer than 280. Though the US Navy still has no equal, the way the carrier Abraham Lincoln responded to the tsunami — providing assistance and projecting American goodwill and power — sparked a lot of discussion in China about whether to acquire or build its own aircraft carriers.

Burma

A churning mini-empire of nationalities, with an abundance of oil, natural gas and minerals, ruled by a despotic regime. “It is a prize to be fought over, as China and India are not so subtly doing,” Kaplan writes. As with North Korea, Beijing does not particularly like the ruler — Gen. Than Shwe — but supports him anyway for access to the Indian Ocean and natural resources.

“Malacca dilemma”

The Strait of Malacca, the narrow corridor for trade to the Middle East and Africa, hosts 50% of the world’s merchant fl eet capacity; 85% of the oil China imports passes through it. It’s rife with piracy. For now, the US and other nations patrol the area, but China is taking a greater role in keeping the peace.

Thailand

To bypass Malacca, there’s speculation that China will help fi nance a new, $20 billion canal in the Isthmus of Kra to provide a faster link to the Indian Ocean. It could be as important to them as the Panama Canal was to us.


Gwadar, Pakistan — the most important city you’ve never heard of - NYPOST.com

 

[Omar1984]

Mega projects to be given to Chinese companies: Zardari wants LPG pipeline to be laid from Gwadar to China
​

ISLAMABAD (October 25, 2010) : President Asif Ali Zardari has directed the ministries concerned to lay a pipeline from Gwadar to China and from Gwadar to his hometown Nawabshah for supply of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) to Karachi, Hyderabad, Nawabshah and Sanghar, sources told Business Recorder. Progress on this project was recently discussed at a meeting recently held under the chairmanship of President Asif Ali Zardari.

Sources said that Pakistan's Ambassador in China has also been directed to address a letter to the Chinese government in co-ordination with Foreign Ministry. The government has also decided to constitute a think-tank, with 20 to 40 years vision, that would look at the regional markets of Africa, Middle East and South Asia (Minister of Education/Foreign Ministry to co-ordinate), and a special task force will be set up for China projects to process and move forward all projects.

Sources said that mega projects, which Pakistan's budget cannot finance, require innovative finance packages eg Gwadar Port, railway from Pakistan to Turkey and Pakistan to Afghanistan. It has also been decided that Basha dam project should be put forward to the Chinese government immediately.

According to sources, BOT projects do not need approval of ECC. Three Gorges Company may be asked to provide a proposal on Bunji darn on BOT basis for further analysis by Ministry of Water and Power under Rules of Business. China is interested on a joint co-operation mechanism in energy sector, especially hydro and coal. The Chinese have called for a conclusive coal policy before they will consider any investment.

Sources said that Pakistan feels that there is a need to talk to the private sector to ascertain what products could be exported to China. Ambassador at Large, Khalil Ahmad explained that CHINT Group of China is interested in 10 megawatt solar projects, and has been asked to launch the project. AEDB and Ministry of Water and Power will ensure early processing of this offer.

Sources said that the President wants up to 20,000 Pakistanis to be trained in China and learn Chinese language. Minister for Education will contact big companies with contracts in Pakistan such as China Mobile to fund scholarships. Finance and Foreign Ministries would support Pakistani interpreters to learn Chinese.

The President is also of the view that Pakistan's young must learn Chinese working practices. Fifty to a hundred nurses would be sent to China under the programme. China is also being requested for a special interest-free loan for Pakistan's film industry. Coins will also be printed: One side Z A Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto and the other side Mao Tse-Tung and President Hu Jintao. It has also been decided that public sector works should start in Badin power project plants (5000 megawatt under supervision of Secretary General Salman Farooqi). He is engaged in talks with General Electric regarding new plans.

 

[Omar1984]

Gwadar Port may be given to China Special Report on Balochistan
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GWADAR: The news that Gwadar port is all set to be taken away from the Port of Singapore Authority (PSA) and is likely to be given to the Chinese may have repercussions that go much beyond its white sand shores.

Official sources confirm that “an understanding to that effect has already developed at the highest levels but it will take a while before the legal and administrative constraints are removed.” The biggest constraint remains the agreement with the PSA, which was given the right to run the port for 40 years. However, official sources are confident that the PSA had given them sufficient grounds to revoke the agreement. Apart from its failure to bring a single commercial ship to the Gwadar docks, the PSA has not invested even a fraction of the $525 million it had committed to spend in five years.

“The port should have gone to the Chinese, who built it largely from their own investment, in the first place,” says Baloch nationalist Rauf Khan Sasoli, who accuses former President Pervez Musharraf of giving it to the PSA “to please his American masters.”

It may not be easy for Pakistan as the move has the potential to throw the regional geo-politics into a tailspin. Analyst Farman Kakar sees it as a paradigm shift in what he calls the new Eurasian great game over energy. It does add a new perspective to the pipeline warfare that was seen earlier as the battle between two competing pipelines - Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) and Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI). The geo-strategic rivalry was believed to be the real basis for much of the action that has taken place in and around Afghanistan in the last two decades.

The move to hand over Gwadar to China, among other things, may just be the first step to replace the erstwhile IPI into a new reality - Iran-Pakistan-China (IPC). The acronym already stood dissolved after India backed out of the Iran-Pakistan gas deal.

It will mean much more than the transfer of power at the Gwadar port. The Chinese will build Gwadar as tax-free industrial hub which may include oil and gas refineries and a network of roads and railways from Gwadar to China through the ancient silk route. An ambitious deal to build railways along the Khunjrab pass has already been signed between Pakistan and China.

The Chinese are more suited to develop the Gwadar port and the network of rail and roads in Balochistan as they have experience and the muscle to work in the troublesome part of Pakistan. “They are already in Saindak and have completed Gwadar despite repeated kidnappings and attacks on their employees,” said journalist Behram Baloch. “China may be the only country which can work under the difficult Balochistan conditions.”

The Chinese have the capacity to not only make Gwadar port viable but can complete the expansion plan, which includes increasing the existing three berths to 18 by 2014. The volume of the Chinese trade is so much that Gwadar can beat regional giants like Dubai hands down if China could divert only a fraction of its trade to pass to its burgeoning western regions through the mighty Karakorams.

This might herald Gwadar’s entry into the league of cities that it always deserved but was denied by the currents of history. It has all the ingredients that should make it an exotic 21st century city - a deepwater port equipped with a network of rail and roadways, industrial tax-free zones and oil and natural gas pipelines, extending north into China on one side and through a stabilised Afghanistan into Central Asia on the other. Gwadar offers to become a gateway to landlocked, hydrocarbon-rich Central Asia; the hub of a new Silk Road, both land and maritime; a regional centre of trans-shipping heralding Pakistan’s drift into Middle East rather than the traditional subcontinent polemics. What it lacks is the political stability - an essential requirement for any grand agenda to materialise.

This may be the weakest link that invites trouble from all the powers whose perceived interests get affected in Gwadar. So we have a theatre of proxy war where everybody, from CIA, Mossad, RAW, Khad to M15, may be involved in festering trouble in our backyard. For all its dreamy features, Gwadar trickles not just the local imagination but it ripples across the world over.

The project is bound to arch lots of eyebrows in India on our east and NATO forces, read the US, sitting on our right flank. China has capitalised on India’s loss. Beijing and Islamabad had set up an agreement whereby China would import most of this Iranian gas left by India. Islamabad hopes to make a billion dollar a year just from transit fee.

Gwadar is the ideal transit corridor for China to import oil and gas from Iran and the Persian Gulf. It represents a cheaper and safer alternative route than the Strait of Malacca, where Beijing faces problems of piracy and which is under US sphere of influence. Analyst say even the Russians may not have an issue with the advent of the IPC.

With Iranian gas diverted to south Asia, Russia’s Gazprom has one rival less for the European market. Brussels was relying on Nabucci pipeline, which bypasses Russia, to lessen its reliance on the Russian gas. But the Nabucco project is dependent on gas from either Iran or Turkmenistan. The Turkmenistan distribution is controlled by Russia. The IPC can deprive the Nabucco project of its second major source.

It’s a nightmare scenario for Washington. Even the TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India) pipeline, if things go well for the US in Afghanistan, may become TAPC (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-China).

This might be a vindication for all those ‘conspiracy theorists’ who have always claimed that the real reason for the American war on terror was this energy game. This makes Pakistan, actually Gwadar, the most important theatre of war in the coming days. It becomes even more important for Pakistan to handle the Balochistan issue, mend its fences with the estranged pawns in this grand game of global chess.

Robert Kaplan wrote about Gwadar that its development would either unlock the riches of Central Asia, or plunge Pakistan into a savage, and potentially terminal, civil war. The way things are going in Balochistan we seem headed towards the second option.

 

[Omar1984]

I think it would be in Pakistan's best interest to give Gwadar Port to China.

Pakistan's interests are same as China's interests.

PSA is not interested in working on Gwadar Port.


Gwadar Port is as important to China as it is to Pakistan so we know China will work hard on Gwadar and help Pakistan develop that very important city.

 

[Karachiite]

We badly need another developed city and Gwadar is the way to go. Give it to China for now.

 

[alibaz]

I think it would be in Pakistan's best interest to give Gwadar Port to China.

Pakistan's interests are same as China's interests.

PSA is not interested in working on Gwadar Port.


Gwadar Port is as important to China as it is to Pakistan so we know China will work hard on Gwadar and help Pakistan develop that very important city.

Gawadar Port is important to Pakistan, to China and many countries up north as well but it definitely screws balls of many too. We should avoid confrontation and be helpful to as many possible, our interests will automatically be looked after if many people have economic interests. What we need is, go by Pakistani interests only, probably develop yet another port city simultaneously. By looking after economic interests of maximum possible friends will be more beneficial.

 

[Hyde]

I think it would be in Pakistan's best interest to give Gwadar Port to China.

Pakistan's interests are same as China's interests.

PSA is not interested in working on Gwadar Port.


Gwadar Port is as important to China as it is to Pakistan so we know China will work hard on Gwadar and help Pakistan develop that very important city.

Bad Idea yaar,
I don't why know some peoples always want Gwadar port to be handed over to China

Its our port, we should remain the prime owner of this port, we must do everything ourself........ we must welcome chinese investment and allow them to use this port for their best interests and pay taxes in exchange.......Its a simple business deal

Come use our facilities and pay a rent, service charges...

But never give them a full control of this port whatsoever. Give them full access to the port but least control