Лев и дракон: новый этап китайско-иранского стратегического партнёрства

3. CHINESE DEVELOPMENT OF IRANIAN TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE

3.1. Iran as a viable land bridge for landlocked Central Asian and the Caucasus states

Iran's geographic location makes it the only viable land bridge from the Persian Gulf to the landlocked Central Asian states (a market with a population of about 65 million) and the three Caucasus states (Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia), where China seeks to become a significant economic and political force. At the moment, the CA have three outlets to world markets: east via China, south via Iran, and west via Russia. The successful implementation of OBOR gives China de facto control over two of the three outlets [31].

The location of the deep-water port of Chabahar on the Indian Ocean in the direction of International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) 7, thus, transit relations between Russia, Eastern Europe, North, CA and the Caucasus, on the one hand, and Southeast Asia, the Far East, the countries of Oceania and the Persian Gulf on the other hand, are seen as significant advantages for Iran's participation in the Chinese BRI [10].8

China’s first practical move towards consolidating connectivity with the ME was when the first freight train, called the Silk Road train, to travel the old Silk Road arrived in Tehran carrying goods from China and making the sea voyage of the cargo ships through Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan in just 14 days, compared with around 45 days by sea between China’s Shanghai port to Iran’s Bandar Abbas port city [39]. The train arrived in Tehran on February 16, 2016, leaving Yiwu city in eastern China's Zhejiang province on January 28, covering a distance of 10,399 km [48; 13; 36; 42]. The 575-mile railway line between the Kazakhstan, Iran and Turkmenistan (a part of International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) planned to connect the markets of Russia, China, countries of CA and the ME) [22], was opened back in December 2014 [31]. The most important core of this section was the Gorgan - Inche - Burun - Etrek - Bereket line, the eastern branch of INSTC, facilitating cooperation between countries on the eastern and western shores of the Caspian Sea through northern Iran [8].

Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Iran railway. China's railway authority has put forward another ambitious plan to build a SR high-speed railway, which would connect northwest China to West Asia (WA) via CA. The route would lead from China's Urumqi and Yining to Almaty (Kazakhstan), followed by Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan), Tashkent and Samarkand (Uzbekistan) and Ashgabat (Turkmenistan) before finally joining the train network in WA through Tehran [40].9

Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and China railroad project. Agreement to conduct feasibility studies on a railroad project that would connect Iran to Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and China was signed by all involved sides in October 2010. The railroad will reduce the distance for commercial transport between the East (from China to Iran) and the West (toward Western Europe), further shorten the existing route that connects China to the countries of West Asia and the ME in order to take oil products from the Persian Gulf and to help connect Afghanistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan to the free waters of the Persian Gulf through the Iranian soil [47]. These countries reaffirmed the importance to construct a railway - then called the North-South Corridor - in July 2012 [78].10

China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway line. Another railway project was the construction of the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway, which will connect Kashgar (Xinjiang) with Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, and the Kyrgyz branch will connect through Tajikistan with Iran and the Persian Gulf countries [76, p. 38; 11]. In 2012, the Chinese construction corporation CRBC11 agreed to conduct a feasibility study for a railway line project running from Kashgar (Xinjiang) through Torugart and Kara-Suu (Kyrgyzstan) to Andijan (Uzbekistan), then through Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey to Europe [72].12