Tajikistan begins talks with Iran over use of Chabahar port

New Delhi: India’s Eurasia connectivity will get further boost with Tajikistan beginning negotiations with Iran on cargo transit via Chabahar port that New Delhi has assisted in building and signed a 10-year deal in 2024 with Tehran for the port management.

Tajikistan is negotiating with Iran for the transit of its cargo through the Chabahar port as it seeks to widen its trade ties with India, the Gulf and Indian Ocean Region countries.

Tajikistan’s transport minister Azim Ibrohim and Iran’s minister of roads and urban development Farzaneh Sadeghi recently signed a Cooperation Program for the development of transit cargo transportation through the port of Chabahar, ET has learnt. Earlier, the Tajik authorities also announced plans for the use of Bandar Abbas port to transport Tajik goods.


As Tajikistan does not share a boundary with Iran, it will access the Chabahar port either through Uzbekistan-Turkmenistan before reaching Iran or through Afghanistan with which it shares a border. The Afghanistan route is the shortest way for Tajikistan to access the Chabahar port.

Tajikistan, unlike the rest of Central Asia, has not widened ties with the Taliban but is slowly establishing working relations with Kabul. Islamist outfit Jamaat Ansarullah, which wants to overthrow Tajikistan President Emomali Rahmon, operates out of Afghanistan.

Tajikistan is a factor in Afghan society and polity and vice versa as Afghanistan houses a big Tajik population. Tajikistan is home to anti-Taliban National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRA) which was formerly the Northern Alliance. Dushanabe, while open to hedge against the Taliban, may not be keen to create any security alliance at Pakistan’s behest against the current dispensation in Kabul.

It is not Tajikistan alone, but Central Asian states of Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan are also keen to use the Chabahar port for trade with the Indian Ocean Region. Uzbekistan earlier was keen to form a trilateral with Iran and India for the Chabahar port as well as the INSTC.

The move by Tajikistan to use the Chabahar port comes days after Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri met his Iranian counterpart here and Acting Foreign Minister of Afghanistan in Dubai and discussed optimum use of the Chabahar port. Both INSTC and the Chabahar port provide the Eurasian states an alternative to the Chinese BRI.