Armenia cannot join BTK till resolution of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
By Sara Rajabova
Baku says the issue of Armenia's joining the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway can be considered only after the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Head of Azerbaijan Railways Arif Asgarov said on October 22 that all interested parties can join the BTK railway project at this stage, with the exception of Armenia.
Armenia occupied over 20 percent of Azerbaijan's internationally recognized territory, including Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent regions, after laying territorial claims against its South Caucasus neighbor that caused a brutal war in the early 1990s. Long-standing efforts by U.S, Russian and French mediators have been largely fruitless so far. The UN Security Council has passed four resolutions on Armenian withdrawal from the Azerbaijani territory, but they have not been enforced to this day.
Earlier, Azerbaijani Transport Minister Ziya Mammadov announced that Armenia will not be able to participate in Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway project until it doesn't stop the occupation of Azerbaijani lands.
Only after the end of the occupation, Georgia, Turkey and Azerbaijan can think on the accession of Armenia to the project, which is constructed by Baku's initiative and budget, he said.
Kazakhstan and Afghanistan have already expressed their willingness to join the project.
The Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway is being constructed on the basis of the Georgian-Azerbaijani-Turkish intergovernmental agreement.
The project is planned to be completed in 2015, and it is scheduled to launch the first test work train in late 2014.
Azerbaijan's state oil fund SOFAZ finances the project in accordance with the Azerbaijani president's decree 'On the implementation of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars project activities' dated February 21, 2007.
A new 105-kilometer branch of the railroad is being constructed as part of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars project. In addition, the railway's Akhalkalaki-Marabda-Tbilisi section is under reconstruction in Georgia, which will increase its capacity to 15 million metric tons of cargo per year. A post is under construction in Akhalkalaki for the transition of trains from the existing tracks in Georgia to the European ones.
The peak capacity of the corridor will be 17 million metric tons of cargo per year. At the initial stage, this figure will be one million passengers and 6.5 million metric tons of cargo.