Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and China will hold a tripartite meeting on the implementation of the agreement on the international road transport, the Uzbek Foreign Ministry reported.
The meeting will be held in Tashkent on January 24-25. Before the trilateral meeting, a bilateral Uzbek-Kyrgyz and Uzbek-Chinese meetings on international road transport issues will be held.
Delegations of the Ministry of Transport of the People’s Republic of China, the Ministry of Transport and Roads of the Kyrgyz Republic and the Uzbek Agency for Automobile and River Transport will participate in the meeting.
The agreement between the governments of Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and China on international road transport was signed on February 19, 1998.
Currently transportation between Uzbekistan and China is carried out mainly by rail through Kazakh-Chinese checkpoints, which entails significant costs and time lost.
The new transport corridor Tashkent – Andijan (Uzbekistan) – Osh – Irkeshtam (Kyrgyzstan) – Kashgar (China) is the shortest automobile route from the Fergana Valley to China. In late October 2017 Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and China successfully organized the first pilot caravan of nine cars that passed along this route.
The three countries also mull the rail line, which is expected to open up access for supplies of goods to the markets of Western Asia and the countries of the Middle East. It will become one of the shortest routes for the transport of Chinese goods to the EU. (Trend/Business World Magazine)