2024-03-19 13:43:44
Source: Trend International Information Agency
Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan play a key role in achieving the success of the Middle Corridor.
Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan Roman Vasilenko said this in an exclusive interview with Trend, Day.Az reports.
“Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan are key countries for the success of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route project, also known as the Middle Corridor. And it is no coincidence that Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Georgia, the four key countries at the center of this corridor, have been working very closely over the past years to develop it “Several meetings have already taken place at the level of foreign ministers and transport ministers of these four countries in Baku and Aktau. As a result, corresponding road maps were signed aimed at eliminating the so-called bottlenecks along this route,” he noted.
Deputy Minister Vasilenko emphasized that over the past two years, the volume of cargo transportation along this route has more than tripled, doubling in 2022, and increasing by 65 percent in 2023 – from about 840 thousand tons in 2021 to 2.76 million tons in 2023.
“And, of course, the plans now are such that this volume will continue to grow many times over the next years, again thanks to the coordinated efforts of various states both in the region and outside the region.
I would also like to note that Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia have created a joint venture called MiddleCorridorMultimodalLimited. This company is registered in Astana, on the site of the Astana International Financial Center. This joint venture of the three railways of Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia will also be called upon to unify the tariff policy, coordinate the provision of rolling stock, locomotives and, in general, the provision of end-to-end services on this route in our three countries,” Vasilenko mentioned.
According to the deputy minister, a lot of work is being done with external partners from outside the region.
“We are talking about both China, which is essentially the main sender of goods along this route, and the European Union, which is the main recipient of these goods transported across the vast expanses of Eurasia by land, and with the G7, which is implementing a global initiative called “Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment” (PGII) We believe that all these big concepts, such as the “One Belt, One Road” promoted by China, or the GlobalGateway program promoted by the European Union, or PGII, from the point of view From the point of view of the countries of the region, these are all complementary initiatives, and their implementation will be beneficial to all countries of Central Asia and the South Caucasus, and it will also be beneficial, in fact, to all these external players, so we do not see much competition in them, we see complementarity” , he added.
Speaking about the Global Gateway 2024 forum held in Brussels at the end of January, dedicated to the development of transport corridors between the EU and Central Asia, Vasilenko noted that the forum was based on the report that was presented last summer by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), and was carried out by order of the European Commission.
“The subject of the research of this report was the study of the most competitive and not very competitive, promising directions for the development of transport communications in Central Asia. The report stated that the so-called “Central Trans-Caspian Transport Network” passing through Southern Kazakhstan is the most stable and promising line to connect Europe and China through Central Asia, first through the South Caucasus, then through Central Asia. And the EBRD proposed a two-zone approach, according to which along this line, entering Kazakhstan at the Khorgos transport crossing, then going southwest to Almaty, then through Taraz, then Shymkent, Kyzylorda, Beyneu and further to Aktau. According to the EBRD report, on a 500-kilometer strip it is proposed to develop transport projects covering all five Central Asian states. And the bank’s experts calculated that the implementation of 40 measures would require 18, 13 billion euros, of which 33 projects are dedicated to the so-called hard infrastructure, and another 7 measures are dedicated to soft infrastructure, interconnection, digitalization of freight supplies, Anchor and so on. European structures together with Central Asia worked on the practical implementation of this report in order to prepare this forum, which ended successfully, and the European structures announced an amount of 10 billion euros in the form of loans or soft loans, or investments that will be provided to the countries of the region or companies implementing these projects, in particular through the EBRD, or through the European Investment Bank (EIB),” Vasilenko explained.
As for specific agreements, the deputy minister said that within the framework of the forum, several memorandums were concluded with the EBRD and the EIB, providing for financing or opening credit lines, including financing of projects in Kazakhstan worth about 1.5 billion euros.
“In this case, the European side approaches financing projects in Central Asia in this way. As for holding a coordination meeting with partners from the EU, we are interested in further coordination with all our partners, both with Europeans and with other countries, because the scale the tasks are very large, and coordination, of course, is necessary,” Roman Vasilenko said in conclusion.
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