Rovshan Rustamov: BTK to be fully modernized in next 2 months

About 95% of the work on the complete modernization of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway line and increasing its throughput capacity to five million tons has been completed, Rovshan Rustamov, chairman of Azerbaijan Railways CJSC, told journalists while on a visit to Georgia, the Georgian bureau of Report informs.

He noted that the design work is planned to be fully completed in the next two months.

“As you know, according to the instructions of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, work on modernizing the BTK and expanding the design capacity began at the beginning of last year,” he said.

Rustamov added that the third stage of the five-stage project has already been completed: “The remaining work is also planned to be completed within two months.”

“One of the biggest benefits that this road will bring to our country will be an increase in the volume of transit cargo,” Rustamov said.

The BTK was launched on October 30, 2017. The railway line connects the railway networks of Asia and Europe. This is the shortest route not only between three countries, but also between Asia and Europe. BTK makes it possible to halve the time for transporting goods. The railway simplifies the access of the countries of Central Asia - Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan to European and world markets.

There are 504 km of railway across the territory of Azerbaijan, the total length of the railway is 846 km. There are 263 km of railway lines through Georgia and 79 km through Türkiye.