Kazakhstan expresses confidence in trade with India through Chabahar

New Delhi [India], Feb 10 (ANI): Kazakhstan has shown confidence in using the Chabahar port to further trade with India, on the sidelines of an event here on Sunday.
"Our trade is growing but there is potential for much more. Chabahar and Bandar Abbas are part of one project in reality. Later when Chabahar will be completed, they will construct a railway from Chabahar to the Iranian railway network, it will later go to Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan...," the Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan to India, Bulat Sarsenbayev told ANI, while referring to the Iranian ports.
"During the meeting between the respective Ministers of Foreign Affairs in Samarkhand, with the participation of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Afghanistan's Foreign Minister, our Minister of Foreign Affairs, Beibut Atamkulov, proposed to set up a consortium to upgrade this north-south corridor in order to speed it up...According to information given to me by the Ambassador of India to Astana, Prabhat Kumar, India has already started something in this area," he said.
The probable north-south corridor may go through Iran (Chabahar), Turkmenistan then Kazakhstan on one side for India or Chabahar, Afghanistan and then further. "However, it's a long way still to build the connection. At least 2-4 years at minimum, "the Kazakh diplomat put forth.
He further outlined that India and Kazakhstan collaborate on a wide spectrum of areas, including IT, FinTech, gas, renewable sources of energy amongst others. In fact, Sarsenbayev outlined that a delegation from Kazakhstan's Ministry of Defence and Aerospace Industry would be visiting Bangalore for a show, after which they will be visiting ISRO to hold discussions on collaborations.
"We will be looking forward to collaboration in fintech, IT areas because we know these are India's strong points. The way you have Make in India, we have Made in Kazakhstan, the way you have Smart Cities, we have Green Cities...We have a very common agenda and vision which helps us collaborate," he also mentioned.
Sarsenbayev also talked about how Astana had no objections with regard to India's bid to the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG). "We have no objection on it but it does not solely dependent on Kazakhstan. We provide support to India in many areas. Last year, being a non-permanent member of the Security Council, we voted for India to the International Arbitration," he said.
The diplomat also noted that India and China for the moment, has an understanding between two countries. He wished to find solutions to their bilateral issues.(ANI)