Three routes short-listed for Trans-Asian rail link

Three routes short-listed for Trans-Asian rail link

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): Three routes have been short-listed for a proposed Trans-Asia railway link from Singapore to Kunming in China, Malaysia's transport minister said yesterday.

The railway link will be in the form of a network based on the three recommended routes with Thai capital Bangkok as the central point, Ling Liong Sik was quoted by Bernama news agency as saying.

All three routes will use an existing railway line which starts from the island republic of Singapore, passes through peninsular Malaysia and continues to Bangkok.

Under the first proposal, the railway line will branch off eastwards from Bangkok to the Mekong Basin countries of Cambodia and Vietnam and then to Kunming.

Under the second proposal, a railway line will be built from Bangkok to the Vientiane, the capital of land-locked Laos and onwards to Kunming. Laos currently does not have a railway system.

The third proposal links Bangkok to the Burmese capital of Rangoon and eastwards to Kunming.

Ling said Malaysia's national railway company, KTM Bhd., had been appointed as the project coordinator.

Malaysia will finance a feasibility study which is expected to cost two million ringgit (US$800,000). The 10-month study is expected to start in January next year after a consultant has been appointed, Ling said.

Ling said the study would then be submitted to the supervisory body comprising experts from Burma, Cambodia, China, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.

The financing and construction of the rail project will be decided after the study.

The idea of a pan-Asian railway that could some day be linked to Europe was discussed last March at the 25-nation Asia-Europe Meeting in Bangkok.

The railway is expected to speed up development in the Mekong region.