Pakistan approves Gwadar port transfer to China

[Edevelop]

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Wednesday approved a deal transferring from Singapore to China the management of the strategically located deep-sea Gwadar port on the Arabian Sea.

China provided about 75 per cent of the initial $250 million in funding for the construction of the port in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan.

It is currently being operated by Singapore’s PSA International, but needs further development work to become fully operational. According to PSA’s Gwadar website, there has been no ship in the port since November.

“The cabinet today gave approval to transfer Gwadar port operations from Port of Singapore to Chinese Overseas Port Holdings Limited,” Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira told reporters.

“Both the companies have settled their deal,” he said, without giving a timetable for the transfer.

Kaira said that Singapore’s PSA International could not develop or operate Gwadar “as desired” and said he hoped that under new management the port would soon contribute to Pakistan’s flagging economy.

“The Chinese will make more investment to make the project operational,” Kaira said.

China, one of Pakistan’s closest allies and its main arms supplier, has also funded ports in Sri Lanka and has been approached to help build a port in Bangladesh.

Pakistan’s former defence minister Ahmad Mukhtar said in May 2011 that China had agreed to take over port operations at Gwadar.

He also said Islamabad would be “more grateful to the Chinese government if a naval base was being constructed at the site of Gwadar for Pakistan”. At the time, China’s foreign ministry said it was unaware of any such request.

Pakistan approves Gwadar port transfer to China | Pakistan | DAWN.COM

 

[Pakchina]

A milestone has been reached between our two nations, China and Pakistan against Scatland, Western racism and bullying.

 

[beijingwalker]

Pakistan approves port transfer from S'pore to China
Posted: 30 January 2013 2203 hrs

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Wednesday approved a deal transferring from Singapore to China the management of the strategically located deep-sea Gwadar port on the Arabian Sea.

China provided about 75 percent of the initial $250 million in funding for the construction of the port in Pakistan's southwestern province of Baluchistan.

It is currently being operated by Singapore's PSA International, but needs further development work to become fully operational. According to PSA's Gwadar website, there has been no ship in the port since November.

"The cabinet today gave approval to transfer Gwadar port operations from Port of Singapore to Chinese Overseas Port Holdings Limited," Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira told reporters.

"Both the companies have settled their deal," he said, without giving a timetable for the transfer.

Kaira said that Singapore's PSA International could not develop or operate Gwadar "as desired" and said he hoped that under new management the port would soon contribute to Pakistan's flagging economy.

"The Chinese will make more investments to make the project operational," Kaira said.

China, one of Pakistan's closest allies and its main arms supplier, has also funded ports in Sri Lanka and has been approached to help build a port in Bangladesh.

Pakistan's former defence minister Ahmad Mukhtar said in May 2011 that China had agreed to take over port operations at Gwadar.

He also said Islamabad would be "more grateful to the Chinese government if a naval base was being constructed at the site of Gwadar for Pakistan". At the time, China's foreign ministry said it was unaware of any such request.

-CNA/ac

 

[beijingwalker]

Gwadar Port

Gwadar Port is located at the apex of the Arabian Sea and at the mouth of the Persian Gulf, approximately 460 km (290 mi) west of Karachi, 75 km (47 mi) east of Pakistan's border with Iran and 380 km (240 mi) km northeast of the nearest point in Oman across the Arabian Sea. It is situated on the eastern bay of a natural hammerhead-shaped peninsula protruding into the Arabian Sea from the coastline.

Gwadar Port is situated near the strategic Strait of Hormuz and its busy trading and oil shipping lanes. The surrounding region is home to around two-thirds of the world's oil reserves. It is also the nearest warm-water seaport to the landlocked, but energy rich, Central Asian Republics and landlocked Afghanistan.

 

[beijingwalker]

Railway link to Gwadar

Pakistan Railways linked to Trans Railway Network (TARN). Fibre-optic line, oil & gas pipeline rail track linking Karakorum Highway to Gawadar. A six-member committee comprising equal number of experts from both China and Pakistan has been constituted to move forward with the project. China has already prepared a feasibility report of laying a railway track in the difficult terrain of Karakoram linking both the states through Khunjarab Pass.

Pre-feasibility work on the proposed railway line has been completed, Pakistani Ambassador to China Masood Khan told the China.org website in an interview published on Thursday.

“This new link will enhance the economic ties between China and Pakistan as well as create a new link between East and South Asia.”

The planned railway line runs from Kashgar, the old Silk Road town in China’s far-western Xinjiang region, through the Khunjerab pass in *** and on to Havelian, where it will join Pakistan’s railway network.

China is also widening and repaving the Karakoram Highway, which runs from Kashgar through *** to Pakistan, While work on the Chinese side has been completed, China is assisting Pakistan in a $500-million effort to repave and widen the highway in Pakistan and in ***.

 

[Edevelop]

 

[beijingwalker]

A great game begins as China takes control of Gwadar port
Syed Fazl-e-Haider
Oct 7, 2012

Gwadar is an important coastal town in Balochistan. The port has the potential to serve as a secure outlet as well as a storage and transshipment hub for the Middle East and Central Asia oil and gas supplies through a well-defined corridor passing through Pakistan. China has contributed about $198 million (Dh727 million) of the initial investment for the port project.

Under the development plan, Gwadar port will be connected with China's western province of Xinjiang through rail and road links. China's eastern seaboard ports are 3,500 kilometres away from the city of Kashgar in western China, whereas the distance from Kashgar to Gwadar is only 1,500 kilometres. The port facilities are thought to be ideal for China's booming economy. Even if Chinese companies and exporters handle their own cargo, it would make Gwadar port one of the busiest in the region.

Gwadar gives China a land-based oil supply port that is not controlled by superior US naval power. The first thing China is supposed to do as operator is to relaunch the Gwadar oil refinery project, which was halted in 2009, probably because of security concerns in the volatile province. The refinery will have a total capacity of 19 million tonnes of oil per year. The petroleum products produced in Gwadar refinery may be transported to Kashghar in western China by pipeline. The proposed refinery and the oil pipeline is actually a part of a planned Pakistan-China energy corridor.

Gwadar port, through the proposed energy and trade corridors, gives western China access to the sea. Crude oil imports from Iran, the Arab Gulf states and Africa could be transported overland to north-west China through the port.

China considers Gwadar very important for its oil trade, as the present choke point is the Strait of Hormuz, which is becoming congested. In particular, a strategic pipeline from Gwadar to China's borders enables Beijing to import oil from Saudi Arabia. In 2006, King Abdullah reportedly asked Islamabad to help Saudi Arabia to extend oil exports to China.

China is the world's second largest importer of oil, with 80 per cent of imports going through the unsafe Strait of Malacca. A railroad and oil pipeline linking Gwadar with Kashi in western China provides Beijing with the shortest possible route to the oil-rich Middle East, avoiding the Strait of Malacca and the dangerous maritime routes through the South China Sea, the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea. Chinese engineers have already completed a feasibility study for a railroad and oil pipeline, which would enable Gwadar to handle most of the oil tankers headed to China.

The operational control of the port will also enable the dragon to swim in the Indian Ocean, which is strategically important for China as it expands its influence across the region. To ensure the security of shipments along existing routes, a Chinese naval presence at Gwadar could also patrol the Indian Ocean sea lanes. What upsets Washington and New Delhi is the Chinese naval presence near the Strait of Hormuz and its strategy of building a "string of pearls" presence on the Indian Ocean rim.

The US considers Chinese presence in Gwadar a threat to its fleet in the Middle East and also to the strategic oil trade to the Far East and Europe. The US military bases on the Arabian Peninsula expect an interception threat to their communications from Chinese bases in Gwadar.

 

[Audio]

Why is there no tourism here? It looks like fishery, fishery and more fishery. Such a picturesque land strip, it would look brilliant with hotels. Mountains in the back could serve for bycicle paths, rock-climbing etc, desert beyond the city for dune buggies....

You really don't appreciate what you have.

 

[Edevelop]

^^ Not safe.
Anyhow, does this remind you of something you have in the U.S ?

 

[Rizwan Alam]

Why is there no tourism here? It looks like fishery, fishery and more fishery. Such a picturesque land strip, it would look brilliant with hotels. Mountains in the back could serve for bycicle paths, rock-climbing etc, desert beyond the city for dune buggies....

You really don't appreciate what you have.

Dying to go there and other places in Balochistan but you know what our Policies have done to us, can not even travel freely in our own country

 

[Rank]

GOOD WORK!

 

[SHAMK9]

Why is there no tourism here? It looks like fishery, fishery and more fishery. Such a picturesque land strip, it would look brilliant with hotels. Mountains in the back could serve for bycicle paths, rock-climbing etc, desert beyond the city for dune buggies....

You really don't appreciate what you have.

Gwadar is not developed enough yet, right now, its a port city in middle of no where, it had a luxury hotel which closed down due to lack of tourism. How ever, development is on the full swing, new airport, schools, hospitals, etc.

 

[Rizwan Alam]

On Topic,

Good decision!

 

[Audio]

Gwadar is not developed enough yet, it had a luxury hotel which closed down due to lack of tourism.

You need to bugger the Chinese to invest in more then just the industrial port. And to come on vacation to spend some yuan!

 

[Safriz]

Now watch the Mountain monkeys (BLA) go ape on this..
Every little brats in Baluchistan thinks that the whole province is their property..."Baap kii Jageer".