Uzbek president invites EAEU countries to build Uzbekistan-Pakistan railroad

Uzbekistan is developing an Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan railroad project and invites other countries of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) to join the work.

Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev said this on May 25, speaking at an expanded meeting of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council, TASS reports.

"In the current realities, it is important to strengthen joint work on the formation of alternative transport corridors and the creation of sustainable logistic chains . We also invite you to join the work of the project office for the implementation of the Uzbekistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan railroad project," Mirziyoyev said.

The Trans-Afghan railway project is gathering momentum as Uzbekistan prioritizes access to Pakistan’s seaports of Karachi, Gwadar, and Qasim, as part of Tashkent’s bid to diversify its supply routes and increase volumes of Euro-Asian trade, according to The Diplomat.

The geopolitical realignment and instability caused by the prolonged Russia-Ukraine conflict have overturned global calculations about supply routes, especially in Uzbekistan, meaning infrastructure projects previously thought unfeasible are now making progress.

One possible beneficiary is the Trans-Afghan Railway project, strongly pushed by Uzbekistan, which could now undergo a radical change to connect Tashkent with major potential export markets, including China and the EU.

Uzbekistan had already built a 75-kilometre rail link connecting Hairatan on the Uzbekistan-Afghanistan border to the city of Mazar-e-Sharif in northern Afghanistan back in 2011. However, due to high charges and operational issues, the section from Hairatan to Mazar-e-Sharif remains underutilized.

Instead, most rail freight from Uzbekistan to Afghanistan is currently transferred to road transport near the border at Termez or Hairatan.

The Trans-Afghan railway project, first proposed in December 2018 by Uzbekistan, aims at extending the Afghan rail network from Mazar-e-Sharif to Kabul and then to Nangarhar province, where the railway would cross the Torkham border and run into Pakistan via Peshawar.

Once in Pakistan, goods will be offloaded to connect with the Pakistan rail system and from there will eventually travel down to the Pakistani seaports of Karachi, Gwadar, and Qasim.

The railway would have a planned capacity of up to 20 million tons of cargo per annum, and once operational it would slice the travel time for goods transiting from Uzbekistan to Pakistan from 35 days to just 3 to 5 days.

The railway line is planned to be 573 km and will be built with a 1,520 mm Russian gauge at an estimated cost of $4.8 billion. The time frame for the construction is approximately five years.