POLITICAL TIES RE-SHAPE CAUCASIAN RAIL NETWORK
by Nicolas Cheviron

Agence France Presse
April 26, 2009 Sunday 3:35 AM GMT

As Turkey and Armenia move forward to mend fences, competition is
heating up on both sides of the border to snatch up the Trans-Caucasian
freight market.

Turkey has been part of a project launched in 2004 to build a railway
from its eastern city of Kars to Tbilisi and then Baku, vying for a
pivotal role in linking western Europe to Central and Far East Asia.

The project aims to carry one million passengers and 6.5 million
tonnes of goods in 2011 when the railway is to become operational,
and three million passengers and 17 million tonnes of goods in 2034.

Turkey, Georgia and Azerbaijan have planned a budget of 450 million
dollars for this new Silk Road and their presidents have held joint
ceremonies to promote the project, but work on the ground has proved
difficult.

Construction on the Turkish side, which began in July, has been
delayed by severe weather conditions during winter and a rough terrain
dominated by plateaus and mountains.

quot;To complete the project on time, we worked all through the
winter, day and night, at temperatures of -35 degrees C (-31 F),quot;
said Yasar Unlu, project director at Baycel, the company building
the 76-kilometer (47-mile) section of the link from Kars to the
Georgian border.

The 400-strong Baycel team — whose number will reach 1,000 in May —
has so far managed only to dig trenches for the railway and has just
begun laying concrete reinforcements.

And the cost has been climbing: quot;We started out with an estimated
cost of 300 million Turkish liras (181 million dollars, 140 million
euros) for the Turkish section, but now we think the final cost will
reach 450 million Turkish liras,quot; Unlu told AFP.

— Our objective is not to go through Armenia —

———————————————- —

Georgia has to build 26 kilometres (16 miles) of new rails to connect
with the existing network and quot;work has started and is continuing
on this new section,quot; Unlu added.

The Turkish team admitted that one of the aims of the project was
to bypass Armenia whose railroad to Turkey, linking the landlocked
former Soviet nation to the west, has been cut off for more than a
decade amid political tensions.

quot;Our objective is to create a loop-line and not go through Armenia
because it is a country that poses problems,quot; team supervisor
Zafer Karatas said.

Yerevan says Ottoman Turks committed genocide against their Armenian
subjects, massacring up to 1.5 million people. Ankara categorically
rejects the accusations.

In 1993, Turkey also shut its border with Armenia in a show of
solidarity with Azerbaijan in its conflict with Yerevan over the
Nagorny Karabakh enclave.

The closure of the border also spelled the end of railway travel
between Kars and the western Armenian town of Gyumri.

But prospects of reconciliation were boosted Wednesday as Turkey and
Armenia announced they had agreed a quot;roadmapquot; on normalising
ties in ongoing negotiations.

In Armenia, the South Caucasian Railways — a Russian company in
charge of the local railway network — is already preparing for
a possible re-opening of the Kars-Gyumri link should the dialogue
process bears fruit.

quot;The line between Gyumri and the Turkish border was already
renovated before the visit of Turkish President Abdullah Gul to Yerevan
in September,quot; said a company source, who requested anonymity,
adding that rehabilitation work was also underway on other sections
of the Armenian network.

Gul became the first Turkish president to visit Armenia when he
accepted an invitation from Armenian counterpart Serzh Sarkisian to
watch a football match.

US President Barack Obama lent support to the fence-mending efforts
when he visited Ankara in April, calling for a swift normalisation
of ties.

Nevertheless, Unlu underlined that quot;a change in Turkish-Armenian
relations should not not put the Kars-Tbilisi-Baku project in
jeopardy.quot;