China, Pakistan ink deal on transport link
Source: Agencies |
July 6, 2013, Saturday
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Print Edition
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CHINA and Pakistan set their sights yesterday on developing a transport link through rugged mountains, a route they hope will boost economic growth and bring critical oil supplies to China much faster.
A broad agreement for the "economic corridor" was among eight pacts signed following a meeting in Beijing between Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
The 2,000-kilometer transport link was described as a "long-term plan" to connect Kashgar in northwestern China to the Pakistani port of Gwadar, likely by road in the beginning and possibly by rail later.
Another agreement is for a fiber-optic cable to be laid from the Chinese border to the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi which will boost Pakistan's access to international communications networks. China is to provide 85 percent of the financing for the three-year project's US$44 million budget, with Pakistan covering the rest.
Sharif's visit to China is his first foreign trip since returning to power last month, highlighting the importance Pakistan places on its 63-year-old relationship with its important regional ally.
"Let me tell you very candidly and very sincerely that what I am witnessing here on my visit to Beijing, it reminds me of the saying our friendship is higher than the Himalayas and deeper than the deepest sea in the world, and sweeter than honey," Sharif told Li at the start of their meeting.
Hopes for road, rail and pipeline links from Kashgar to the presently little-used port at Gwadar received a major boost when control of the port was transferred to China's state-owned China Overseas Ports Holding Co Ltd in February. Built by Chinese workers and opened in 2007, it is undergoing a major expansion to turn it into a full-fledged, deep water commercial port.
A joint statement issued after the meeting said a joint committee will be set up that will oversee the upgrading and realigning of the 1,300-kilometer Karakoram highway running from Kashgar to the Pakistani town of Abbottabad over mountain passes as high as 4,693 meters.
If the transport link takes off, oil from the Middle East could be offloaded at Gwadar, which is located just outside the mouth of the Gulf, and transported to China through Baluchistan Province in Pakistan and the rugged Karakoram mountains. Such a link would vastly cut the 12,000-kilometer route that Mideast oil supplies must now take to reach Chinese ports.
Gwadar could also be an outlet for copper and other resources that Chinese companies plan to mine in Afghanistan, while offering a base for China's Navy to operate in the Indian Ocean.
China has already begun upgrading the Karakoram highway and has dispatched workers to develop projects high in the mountains of the Pakistan-controlled part of Kashmir. The geographical and security challenges to the link remain daunting, however, and any working link is likely many years away.
A broad agreement for the "economic corridor" was among eight pacts signed following a meeting in Beijing between Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
The 2,000-kilometer transport link was described as a "long-term plan" to connect Kashgar in northwestern China to the Pakistani port of Gwadar, likely by road in the beginning and possibly by rail later.
Another agreement is for a fiber-optic cable to be laid from the Chinese border to the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi which will boost Pakistan's access to international communications networks. China is to provide 85 percent of the financing for the three-year project's US$44 million budget, with Pakistan covering the rest.
Sharif's visit to China is his first foreign trip since returning to power last month, highlighting the importance Pakistan places on its 63-year-old relationship with its important regional ally.
"Let me tell you very candidly and very sincerely that what I am witnessing here on my visit to Beijing, it reminds me of the saying our friendship is higher than the Himalayas and deeper than the deepest sea in the world, and sweeter than honey," Sharif told Li at the start of their meeting.
Hopes for road, rail and pipeline links from Kashgar to the presently little-used port at Gwadar received a major boost when control of the port was transferred to China's state-owned China Overseas Ports Holding Co Ltd in February. Built by Chinese workers and opened in 2007, it is undergoing a major expansion to turn it into a full-fledged, deep water commercial port.
A joint statement issued after the meeting said a joint committee will be set up that will oversee the upgrading and realigning of the 1,300-kilometer Karakoram highway running from Kashgar to the Pakistani town of Abbottabad over mountain passes as high as 4,693 meters.
If the transport link takes off, oil from the Middle East could be offloaded at Gwadar, which is located just outside the mouth of the Gulf, and transported to China through Baluchistan Province in Pakistan and the rugged Karakoram mountains. Such a link would vastly cut the 12,000-kilometer route that Mideast oil supplies must now take to reach Chinese ports.
Gwadar could also be an outlet for copper and other resources that Chinese companies plan to mine in Afghanistan, while offering a base for China's Navy to operate in the Indian Ocean.
China has already begun upgrading the Karakoram highway and has dispatched workers to develop projects high in the mountains of the Pakistan-controlled part of Kashmir. The geographical and security challenges to the link remain daunting, however, and any working link is likely many years away.
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