ArmInfo. How long will the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure (MTAI) of Armenia remain silent about the results of the feasibility study of the Crossroads of Peace project? This is the question posed by the head of the ACSES analytical center Haykaz Fanyan.
Back in July last year, when two deputy prime ministers met with a delegation led by US State Department representative Erin McKee, it became clear that the feasibility study was being developed with the financial support of USAID (according to my information, the contractor was an international company, and the cost exceeded $ 1 million).
Later, during the Yerevan Dialogue event, Deputy Minister of Transport and Communications Armen Simonyan presented to the audience a preliminary feasibility study of the Meghri-Yeraskh-Akhurik railway, one of the components of the Crossroads of the World project, Fanyan wrote on the social network.
According to him, according to the preliminary estimate presented that day, the investment volume will be about 360 million US dollars, the internal rate of return (EIRR) - 8.69%, passenger turnover (annual) - 292,000, and freight turnover (annual) - 4.64 million tons.
To better understand the scale of the information presented, the economist notes that in 2024, the freight turnover of the RA Railway (SCR) was only 1.44 million tons, and by 2050, according to forecasts, these 4.64 million tons will reach approximately 9.9 million tons. "In short, this component in this form is economically profitable," the head of ACSES notes. "It would seem that MTUI should have published the preliminary results of this study as soon as possible, the deputy minister should have spoken about it from all "corners," but he is silent... Recently, during a meeting on another topic, when we asked about this study, Armen Simonyan promised to provide it in case of a written request. We were very surprised when, in response to our letter, another deputy minister of MTUI said that they do not have such a study, and all our further attempts to get an intelligible answer from Armen Simonyan were unsuccessful:
When I was preparing this publication, I thought about how many studies worth millions of dollars have gathered dust on the shelves of our officials over the past 34 years, which were then thrown into the trash, or how many computers have been like this:
P.S. I assume that this will be justified by the fact that the final report is not available due to the termination of USAID funding, and we cannot provide it, but then another question arises: what has the ministry done in the last 6 months to complete the study? Doesn't our country need this feasibility study? ", - asks Haykaz Fanyan.
Recall that on October 26, 2023, during the international forum "Silk Road" in Tbilisi, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan presented the "Crossroads of the Peace" project, which, in fact, is the Armenian version of the project to unblock communications in the region after the 44-day war. According to him, the "Crossroads of Peace" can connect the states of the South Caucasus with each other, as well as the vast expanse of Eurasia with roads and railways, energy communications - gas pipelines, cables, power lines. Through the implementation of the "Crossroads of the Peace" project, the shortest route between the Black Sea and the Persian Gulf, through the territories of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Republic of Armenia and Georgia (this is the north-south direction), as well as the shortest route between the Caspian and Marmara Seas, through the territories of the Republic of Azerbaijan, the Republic of Armenia and Turkey (this is the east-west direction), will operate.
