Tehran and Baku have drafted a plan for financing and implementing a key railroad project connecting Iran’s two northern cities of Rasht and Astara in a meeting between Iran’s deputy minister of roads and urban development, Asghar Fakhrieh-Kashan, and Azerbaijan’s deputy economy minister, Sahil Babayev, in Baku on Tuesday. Fakhrieh-Kashan added that the plan will pave the way for signing a contract “within the next few months” on joint investment in the construction of the railroad, which is one of the missing links in the so-called International North-South Transport Corridor—a multimodal transit route connecting India, Central Asia and Russia through Iran and Azerbaijan, IRNA reported on Wednesday. According to Minister of Roads and Urban Development Abbas Akhoundi, Rasht-Astara railroad, which will have the capacity of transporting 10 million tons of goods and three million passengers per year upon inauguration, requires $1 billion, half of which will be funded by Azerbaijan.
