Armenian expert considers construction of Iran-Armenia railway through Zangezur as unfeasible

ArmInfo. Construction of a railway through Zangezur to Iran is not realistic neither from technical nor from financial point of view, Ara Papyan, Director of the Modus Vivendi Center, expressed this opinion at the press conference on February 10.

He is sure that in upcoming years the construction of other more beneficial railways will be finished, meanwhile construction of the abovementioned railway will take at least 7 years even if the funds are provided.

"Within a year construction of Ghazvin-Rasht-Astara-Baku railway with an annual freight activity of up to 20 mln tons will be finished. In this light even if there were interested sides in this project now this project is no more actual", the expert noted. In this context he advised the Armenian side to think about activation of Armenia-Nakhijevan-Iran railway.

Papyan recalled that Nakhijevan has never been a part of Azerbaijan neither by Moscow nor by Kars agreements. It was passed to Azerbaijan's protectorate, which did not have right to include it in its territory.  "This railway would allow Armenia developing relations with Iran. In other case lifting sanctions from Iran does not change anything for Armenia, the trade will remain on the same level, as it is today. Armenia will neither have opportunity to benefit from Iranian gas, as Gazprom Armenia holds all the infrastructure and Russian side is the one, with which the negotiations would be held", he summarized.

To recall, in May 2012 Armenia and Iran signed a concessionaire agreement under which the sides held discussions on the technical and economic grounding and the main tasks of projecting, construction and funding of the programme.  The construction is to be carried out within 6 years, the cost of the project is estimated 3.5 bln USD. The length of the road on the Armenian territory is 305 km, it will have 86 bridges of 19.6 km total mileage, as well as 60 tunnels of 102 km total mileage. The construction is to be finished in 2022.It is anticipated that the annual freight activity on the railway route from Gagarin Station (Gegharkunik region) to Agarak (Syunik region) will total 25 million tons. This route is by 44 shorter than the earlier planned railway section Gavar-Agarak.  It will be linked to the operating railway network. The launch of the Southern Railway of Armenia and Southern Highway of Armenia was announced in Jan 2013.  Then a trilateral Memorandum of Understanding was signed by the South Caucasus  Railway of Armenia, Ministry of Transport and Communications of Armenia and Rasia FZE.