KABUL: President Ashraf Ghani arrived in Tehran on Monday to sign a trilateral agreement on the Chabahar port with Iranian and Indian leaders, a media report said.
President Hassan Rouhani officially welcomed Indian Prime Minister Narendra late on Sunday. National anthems of the two countries were played and the leaders reviewed the guard of honour.
Ghani is scheduled to sign a trilateral memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Iran and India on the development of the southeastern Chabahar port — a strategic port in the Gulf of Oman on Iran’s southern coast.
Chabahar is an open sea port in Iran’s Sistan Balochistan province, having a great capacity for shipping goods and services, especially for a land-locked country like Afghanistan.
The agreement reached the signing stage after two technical meetings of representatives and experts from the three countries in New Delhi in December 2015 and in Tehran in April 2016.
With the launch of trade via Chabahar port, Afghanistan could earn millions by shipping a huge quantity of goods and services to Central Asia. Afghanistan will become a trade corridor after Chabahar port became operational.
India will help develop the port, investing in the first phase around $200 million to make terminals and cargo berths. In the next phase, India plans to build a 500-km railway line between Chabahar and Zahedan.
