Azerbaijan, Baku / corr Trend A.Badalova / The construction work over establishment of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway route will begin in November. The company to carry out the construction of the Georgian section of the railway route will be determined by 29 October, Ziya Mammadov, Azerbaijani Transport Minister, said in a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers dedicated results of socio-economic development of the country over 9 months of 2008 and the future tasks. The meeting was presided over Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.
The company to be involved in the construction of the Turkish section of the railway route has been defined.
A state program on development of Azerbaijani railway in 2008-2011 was designed to carry out the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars project, to reconstruct the railway infrastructure on East-West transport corridor, to strengthen rivalry of this corridor, to cut time for cargo delivery and ensure security of deliveries.
A $200mln credit will be allocated to the Georgian Government by the State Oil Fund of Azerbaijan for the construction of the Georgian section of route.
The Baku- Tbilisi-Akhalkalaki- Kars project includes the construction of 105km-railway road with 76 km section running via Turkey and 29 km section via Georgia.
Moreover, 183 km section of Akhalkalaki-Marabda-Tbilisi railway will be also reconstructed to improve the carrying capacity to 15mln tons of cargo per year. It is also planned to build in Akhalkalaki a place for passage of trains from a track existing in Georgia to the European.
The section of the Marabda-Kirtsakhi is a part of Baku-Tbilisi-Kars project, which is assessed at $422mln. Given construction of the infrastructure, it will require a total of $600mln.