By John Lee.
The government of Iraq announced more details this week on its plans to create a transport corridor between the Persian Gulf and the Mediterranean Sea coast in Turkey.
The 1,200-kilometer "development road project", sometimes referred to as the "dry canal project", will link Iraq's Grand Faw port, which is still under construction, by rail to the Mediterranean, with the intention of providing a cost-effective alternative to the Suez Canal.
A conference on the project on Saturday was told that it will cost an estimated $17 billion, and will include approximately 15 train stations along the route.
The director general of the General Company for Ports of Iraq (GCPI) told Reuters that the project could potentially be completed by 2029.
A consultant on international transport, however, told VoA News that transferring the freight between ships and trains casts doubt on the viability of the plan.
(Sources: Media Office of the Prime Minister, Reuters, AFP, VoA News)
Arabic tribes are living on both sides of the golf all the way from the north in Basra to the south in Keesh on the west shore and Abu Dhabi on the west shore; and you are writing to Iraq Business News, yet you call it “Parisian Gulf”!!!
It’s not Parisian at all; it is Arabic Gulf indeed