GEORGIA FOR GOODNEIGHBOUR RELATIONS WITH ARMENIA
ITAR-TASS News Agency, Russia
February 7, 2007 Wednesday 01:56 PM EST
Georgia is for "the development of goodneighbourly relations with all
neighbour countries," President Mikhail Saakashvili said on Wednesday
at the ceremony of signing the agreement on the construction of the
Georgian-Azerbaijani-Turkish railway Kars-Akhalkalaki-Tbilisi-Baku,
"It is important to us that not one country of the region be isolated,
not one country be left out," Saakashvili said. "We are for equal,
close and goodneighbourly relations with Armenia, as the Transcaucasian
countries have no way but joint development," the said.
Armenian Foreign Minister Gegam Gariabdzhanyan said in January that
his country "is ready to open the border with Turkey" and to get
linked up to the railway.
Georgia, Turkey and Azerbaijan began discussing the construction of
the railway back in the 90s, and the negotiations became intensive last
year. To implement the agreement, Georgia will restore 162 kilometres
and build 29 kilometres of the railway, to stretch from Akhalkalaki
to the Turkish border, while Turkey will lay out 75 kilometres of
the railway line. Azerbaijan will give to Georgia a low-interest
one-percent credit for 25 years to a sum of 300 million dollars,
to be repaid by profits from the railway’s operation. Turkey will
bear the expenditures for the construction of the Turkish stretch of
the railway.