Shipping company CEO: Iran - Armenia railway link not justified economically

YEREVAN, February 26. /ARKA/. From the strategic point of view the project to build a railway to connect Armenia to Iran is purely political, and not justified from the business point of view, the executive director of Apaven shipping company Gagik Aghajanyan told a news conference today.

"The volume of cargo turnover between Armenia and Iran is not of interest for rail transportation. It is not worth billions of dollars required to build the rail link,’ he said.

Aghajanyan added that until recently Armenia was seen as the only country that could  link the countries of the region through the proposed railway link, however,  today the situation has changed  and the neighboring countries are now able to communicate with each other bypassing Armenia.

Aghajanyan specified that the railway from  Kars (Turkey) to Akhalkalaki (Georgia) and Baku (Azerbaijan) will soon be commissioned  and about a year later another railway will link Astara (Azerbaijan) with  Rasht and Qazvin in Iran thus to accomplish the construction of North-South transport corridor.

During Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev's visit to Iran on February 23 the sides signed a number of agreements, including an agreement on the merger of the Iranian and Azerbaijani railways. -0-