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Companies from the GCC and other countries are queuing up to grab a share of a $17 billion project for the construction of a 1,175 km rail and road link with Turkey, an Iraqi official said in comments published on Thursday.
The project, one of the largest rail construction schemes in the region, includes several subcontracts and could generate investments of at least $100 billion, said Nasser Al-Asadi, a transport advisor to the Iraqi Prime Minister.
“We have received applications from several companies from the GCC as well as Asia, Europe and African to participate in this strategic project,” he said, quoted by Aliqtisad News network and other Iraqi publications.
In separate remarks, Iraq’s Transport Minister Razzak Al-Saadawi said the cabinet has just endorsed a feasibility study for the project conducted by the Italian engineering services company PEG.
The project, which will be co-funded by Iraq and investors, includes a high-speed electric freight and passenger train and a parallel motorway starting from the Southern Iraqi Faw Port, which is under construction and is designed to be one of the world’s largest container terminals with a capacity of 99 million tonnes per year.
(Writing by Nadim Kawach; Editing by Anoop Menon)
