Georgian Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili said that the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars Railway was inefficient at its current stage. He believes that the Kars-Akhalkalaki Railway construction was questionable, News Georgia reports.
The trilateral railway project was launched in 2007 and called Iron Silk Way. The railway from Akhalkalaki in Georgia to Kars will be 98km long, 68km of them will run in Turkey. The Akhalkalaki-Tbilisi Railway is being re-equipped.
The Baku-Tbilisi-Kars project is part of a greater railway project to connect South Caucasus and Europe through Turkey. An underwater tunnel is being built called Marmaray under the Bosphorus Strait in Istanbul is being constructed. A railway line will be built from Kars to the Nakhchivan Republic of Azerbaijan. The project may turn into part of the Europe-Caucasus-Asia corridor.
The State Oil Fund of the Azerbaijani Republic has been granting Georgia a loan worth $755 million for construction of its 105-km section of the railway and reconstruction of the Akhalkalaki-Marabda-Tbilisi line in portions since 2007.
Azerbaijan plans to grant Turkey a loan worth $1 billion to reconstruct a railway section of 230-240km.
The Azerbaijani Railways is already negotiating purchase of trains for the railway which should be launched in early 2014. Up to 1 million passengers and 6.5 million tons of cargo are expected to be transported at the first stage of the railway operation.
