Azernews.Az

By Sara Israfilbayova

Railway departments of Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Iran, Georgia and Poland signed a protocol of the meeting of the Coordinating Committee for the Development of the South-West International Transport Route on September 7.

The document was signed by Javid Gurbanov, chairman of the Azerbaijan Railways CJSC, Evgeny Kravtsov, acting chairman of the board of the Ukrainian Railways JSC, Władysław Szczepkowski, director for corporate affairs at the Polish State Railways JSC, Mamuka Bakhtadze, director general and chairman of the board of directors at the Georgian Railways JSC, and Saeed Mohammadzadeh, head and chairman of board at the Iran Railways, the Ukrainian Railways reported.

Javid Gurbanov noted that the route "South-West" has great potential, adding: "We want to develop it, because it has already earned, the main thing is to attract more cargo, and for this each of the participating countries develops its railway and port infrastructure.”

In his turn, Evgeny Kravtsov said the signing of the protocol was preceded by two years of intensive cooperation among the project participants.

Addressing the meeting, Szczepkowski stressed that the project participants will popularize the route in the transportation market, adding that a South-West corridor website is already operating.

Bakhtadze underlined that the project participants will introduce through rates, which will help attract additional cargo to the international route.

Mohammadzadeh added, taking his turn, that the Iranian side promotes the development of the route and develops the infrastructure inside the country.

The main role of the South – West corridor is the realization of goods transportation between EU countries and India.

This corridor passing through Iran, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Ukraine and Poland reduces time loss for the goods transportation between Europe and India.

The protocol on the development of combination of different modes of transportation via International Transport Corridor South-West between the heads of railways, maritime and ports of Azerbaijan, Iran, Georgia and Ukraine was signed in Baku on 12 January 2016.

Due to the created conditions, it is possible to transport cargo on the route for 15 days, overcoming the distance of more than 7,000 kilometers, delivering goods from India to Europe.

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