Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, May 30 / Trend, H. Hasanov /
Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhammadov and Kazakh Prime Minister Karim Masimov at a meeting in Ashgabat stressed the need to speed up construction of the North-South railway, the Altyn Asyr national TV channel said on Wednesday.
This large-scale project is implemented based on an intergovernmental agreement signed in 2007 between Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Iran. "Stressing the crucial importance of the steel main, a route of which will run through the territory of Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Iran, and will thus open direct access for the region's states to the Persian Gulf, the sides emphasized the need to accelerate the pace of its construction," the report says.
The North-South project implementation will open access for European and Asian countries to Central Asia and the Persian Gulf.
This way is three times shorter than going via the Suez Canal. The new railway will play a significant role in creating a new social infrastructure in the desert regions, the Caspian Sea and the northern territories from Bereket to the border with Kazakhstan. The projected
volume of traffic on this route is up to 12 million tons per year.