Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan to mull TASIM project realization
By Aynur Jafarova
Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan will discuss laying the Trans-Caspian segment of the Trans-Eurasian Information Super Highway (TASIM), a source in Azerbaijan's telecommunication market told Trend Agency.
Currently, the main issue is financing the construction of the underwater segment. Earlier Azerbaijan made an initiative to finance the construction of the underwater segment which corresponded to Kazakhstan's interest.
The source noted the construction of the Trans-Caspian segment of TASIM may take three months. Prior to starting the construction, another three months will be required for preparing the tender documentations.
The maximum time to complete works on the Trans-Caspian segment of TASIM may take around eight months.
Laying of the Trans-Caspian segment of the cable line is one of the important components in the implementation of the TASIM project. Work on the construction of a fiber-optic cable line under the Caspian Sea is being considered by Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.
The TASIM project envisions the creation of a major transit link from Frankfurt to Hong Kong. The line will connect the major centers of information exchange in Europe and Asia together, stretching through China, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, and Germany. A reserve North transit line will traverse the territory of Russia, Ukraine, and Poland.
A Memorandum of Understanding on the establishment of the TASIM consortium was signed within the framework of the 19th international exhibition and conference BakuTel-2013 which was held in December in Baku.
In September 2013, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution supporting Azerbaijan's initiative on establishment of Eurasian Connectivity Alliance (EuraCA) and construction of TASIM.
TASIM will be implemented in two stages. The project is expected to come on stream at the cost of $100 million.
The length of TASIM will amount to 11,000 kilometers and its initial network bandwidth will reach 2 Tbit/s.
In September 2013, Executive Director on Infrastructural Projects of KazTransCom JSC Alexandr Kislitsyn said that the interest of Kazakhstan in the TASIM project has increased.
"The head of the presidential administration took the project under his personal control. Accordingly, its importance in Kazakhstan has increased. Perhaps, now we will make more efforts to promote the project faster," Kislitsyn said.
Kazakhstan prepared technical specification for the announcement of tender on the project.