Azerbaijan, Baku, 26 September/ Trend / The project of building Gazvin-Rast-Astara (Iran)-Astara (Azerbaijan) railway within North-South project by Azerbaijan, Iran and Russia will be discussed in Baku at three-lateral meeting on 7 to 8 October, State Railway Office of Azerbaijan said.
North-South transport corridor project envisages the construction of railway from Europe to India and to South-East Asia through Russia, Azerbaijan and Iran. The realization of the project requires over $400mln and much of the construction work will be carried out in Iran who does not have railway transport till the border with Azerbaijan. The construction work worth $35mln to $40mln will be carried out in Azerbaijan.
The construction work in Azerbaijan includes the construction of 8.5km of railway till Astara station of Azerbaijan and station with systems of change of wheel pairs, border and customs infrastructure. There is a need also to construct a frontier railway bridge. The project will be realized on parity basis with Iran.
Nearly 15mln tons of cargo is expected to be carried through this corridor a year with 10mln to 15mln tons a year.