South-North railway discussed in Baku

On October 7-8 representatives of Russia, Iran and Azerbaijan will meet in Baku to discuss the possibility of creating a joint venture to build a railway line connecting the three countries, possibly extending as far as India and South-East Asia.

Most of the building work would be conducted in Iran, which has no railway connection with the Azeri border. The latter would need to build only 8.5 km of track and a depot for changing wheels. A customs and guard infrastructure needs to be established at the border crossing by both sides and a bridge also has to be built. The project might require over USD 400 million in financing.

According to prognoses, 5 million tonnes of cargo could be transported along this route annually to begin with. Later this figure will increase to between 10-15 million tonnes.