Pakistan Mulling Extension of ECO Railway to China

Pakistani Minister of Railways Haji Ghulam Ahmed Bilour on Monday announced that the country is mulling the possibility for linking Islamabad-Tehran-Istanbul railway to China.

"After the success of ECO (Economic Cooperation Organization) train, Islamabad is studying the railway between Pakistan-China," Bilour told FNA. He also reiterated that Islamabad has assigned a consortium to examine the railway project between Pakistan and China. Bilour highlighted that Islamabad and Beijing intend to start the project with a freight train in the first stage and they would consider operation of a business class passenger train at a later stage. The first Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) freight started its operation from Islamabad on 14 August, Pakistan's National Day. The 6,500-kilometer railroad is among ECO's major projects. 1,900 km out of the 6,506 km-long railway passes through Pakistan, 2,570 km through Iran and the remaining 2,036 km passes through Turkey. The concept of such a train was proposed at the 18th Regional Planning Council of the ECO held in March 2008 in Islamabad. The regular service of the train is expected to begin next year. The ultimate aim of the project is to start a regular passenger train service between ECO member states and provide a link to Europe and Central Asia. Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are member states of the ECO.