Russia and Azerbaijan boost railway ties under major North-South Corridor Initiative

Russia and Azerbaijan are discussing the development of railway communication within the framework of the North-South International Transport Corridor (ITC).

"We are talking about the development of railway communication. Of course, we always discuss the completion of the next link Rasht-Astara in Iran, which will also provide connectivity in the region and railway access to Iran's ports—Bandar Abbas, first of all—in the Persian Gulf," Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk said following the talks between Russian and Azerbaijani Presidents Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev, Caliber.Az reports per local media.

The meeting of the two presidents took place on July 3 in Kazakhstan on the margins of the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). The Deputy Prime Minister said that at these talks, they had a practical conversation on the implementation of plans to create a corridor North-South.

Overchuk added that [with Azerbaijan] a joint part on organizing traffic through checkpoints on the Azerbaijani-Russian border has already been implemented.

"On the Azerbaijani side, there is a very large infrastructural development, a modern large motorway from the border with Russia to Baku has been launched, and it interfaces with the previously existing similar modern road from Baku to the border with Iran," Overchuk added.

According to him, Iran is also interested in this project, "the country is becoming a serious transit country."

The deputy prime minister also added that road freight traffic in the same direction is significantly increasing, and there are no infrastructural limitations for its growth today.

The North-South ITC is a multimodal route from St. Petersburg to the port of Mumbai (India) with a length of 7,200 kilometers. There are three ITC routes: trans-Caspian (using railways and ports), as well as western and eastern (overland).