Gwadar port city development project | News and Updates

[A.Rafay]

Gwader Civic Centre

According to media reports, the prime minister of Pakistan is visiting Gwadar on November 9 or 11, 2012 to inaugurate the Gwadar Civic Centre, constructed by the Gwadar Port Authority. If the details of the project and previous expenditure on its inauguration are revealed, an amazing picture will emerge. The Gwadar Civic Centre project is a very small project, costing only Rs 188 million and comprising of a ground and mezzanine plus three floors. Its construction was started in March 2007 and was to be completed by the end of September 2008. However, it was actually completed during April 2012 and is now being inaugurated by the PM.The interesting part of the story is that the ground ceremony of this small project has already been carried out twice — once by the then president of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf and again by the then PM of Pakistan, Mr Shaukat Aziz. A huge amount of money was spent on these events; we are talking about billions of rupees. At the time of Musharraf’s visit, it was learnt that a C-130 craft had brought the president’s special car from Islamabad to Pasni. Due to some defect, the car was taken back to Islamabad and another car was brought from Islamabad to Pasni and then driven to Gwadar for the use of the president in Gwadar, which lasted only a few hours. Everyone knows that a visit by the president or PM to a place like Gwadar entails extraordinary security and unimaginable cost; apart from the VVIP and his team, a number of federal ministers, senators, MNAs, federal secretaries and the entire administration of the provincial government, including the chief minister, ministers and chief secretary also attend the ceremony. Now, one can only imagine how much money has been spent on the previous two inaugurations and will be spent on the upcoming one. It is not understood why there is so much hypocrisy in the case of Balochistan where small results are highly exaggerated and projected as big achievements. It is not understood why these huge amounts are not spent on the construction of vital roads, which have been lying in a half complete state for many years, and on the establishment of colleges and universities also in dire need of financial aid. Can anyone tell me what justification exists for spending billions of rupees to inaugurate a project worth Rs 188 million, which should actually have been inaugurated by the commissioner of the district?HAFEEZ BALOCH, Turbat, November 7.

 

[UmarJustice]

Gwadar Port control goes to China today


ISLAMABAD – Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan Liu Jian has maintained that no one should be worried or annoyed by Pakistan’s handing over Gwadar Port to China.

Talking to Nawa-i-Waqt at a function here, the foreign dignitary disclosed that the agreement regarding the transfer of management of the deep-sea port was to be signed on Monday (today).

Jian said no third country should have reservations over this bilateral arrangement which had been decided by Pakistan and China mutually. About India's criticism and concerns regarding the handing over of the port, he replied that no country should have apprehensions over Pak-China cooperation. “This bilateral arrangement is in the economic interest of the peoples of China and Pakistan,” he went on to say. Asked that certain countries were thinking China would use this port for military purposes, the diplomat said this hypothesis was absolutely baseless.

To another query that whether China was worried because of the law and order situation in Balochistan, Jian said security was the responsibility of the Pakistan government. He said at present China had been working on at least 120 different projects in Pakistan; the government had given them security and they were not worried at all.

Asked if the change in government in Pakistan after the elections would have any impact on Pakistan-China ties, the ambassador said the friendship of the two countries was time-tested. “The leadership changed in China, but it did not impact the bilateral ties and friendship between the two states.”

Jian further said China wanted Pakistan’s solidarity and economic development and it would continue helping it. He was of the view that Pakistan should give more attention to its economic development, saying that Gwadar Port would play an important role to this end. He also said that China did not want any clash with any country because it had diverted its total attention to economic development.

AFP adds: China's acquisition of strategic Gwadar Port is the latest addition to its drive to secure energy and maritime routes and give it a potential naval base in Arabian Sea, unsettling India. The Pakistani cabinet on Jan 30 approved the port’s transfer, a commercial failure cut off from the national road network, from Singapore's PSA International to the state-owned China Overseas Port Holdings Limited.

The Pakistanis pitched the deal as an energy and trade corridor that would connect China to Arabian Sea and Strait of Hormuz, a gateway for a third of the world's traded oil, overland through an expanded Karakoram Highway.

Experts say it would slash thousands of kilometres off the distance oil and gas imports from Africa and the Middle East have to be transported to reach China, making Gwadar a potentially vital link in its supply chain.

China paid about 75 per cent of the initial $250 million used to build the port, but in 2007 PSA International won a 40-year lease with then-ruler Pervez Musharraf who was reportedly unwilling to upset Washington by giving it to the Chinese.

Andrew Small, an expert on China-Pakistan relations, told AFP "In the near-to-medium term, it appears that China's interests in this part of the world lean far more towards developing capacities to deal with threats to sea lanes of communication, Chinese citizens overseas and so on."

Plenty of Indian naval strategists are highly sceptical of the likelihood of many of the locations... actually being used as military facilities by China."

But Small does believe that Gwadar is the most mostly likely port to be developed by China for use by the Pakistan Navy, and potentially their own.

"Pakistan is probably the only government where the level of trust between the two militaries is high enough to make that a completely reliable prospect," he said.

Other Pakistani experts suggest that Islamabad is more likely to give the Chinese navy access to its existing naval bases of Karachi or Qasim. "China can always use those. So they do not have to build another naval base at this stage," said Hamayoun Khan, who teaches at the National Defence University in Islamabad.

Fazul-ul-Rehman, former director of the China Studies Centre at the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad, dismisses the prospect of China going to war in the Indian Ocean and calls Indian concern "propaganda".

But he says China has become more cautious about big investment projects in Pakistan due to security concerns. Taliban, sectarian and separatist violence blight Balochistan.


Gwadar Port control goes to China today | The Nation

 

[Safriz]

Handing over ceremony shown live .. Finally it has happened......

 

[AZADPAKISTAN2009]

Congrats on Seucurity of Pakistan , and arrival of new development and prosperity to Pakistan with our Friend China

 

[air marshal]

 

[LIAO]

ye.......Pakistan and China to build a railway through the Karakoram Highway , in order to link China's rail network to Gwadar Port

 

[UmarJustice]

China takes over Gwadar Port operations
Pakistan on Monday formally handed over Gwadar Port’s operations and development of its infrastructure to China at a signing ceremony held at the Presidency in Islamabad.

President Asif Ali Zardari, Chinese Ambassador in Pakistan Liu Jian, Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, federal ministers, members of parliament and government officials were present at the occasion.

Spokesperson to the President Senator Farhatullah Babar said the ceremony actually marked the transfer of Concession Agreement from the Port of Singapore Authority to the China Overseas Port Holding Company.

He said that the president hailed the transfer as an auspicious development in Pak-China relations as well as for the people of Pakistan particularly of Balochistan, saying that it would open window of ‘new opportunities’ for them.

“Gwadar will soon be a “hub of trade and commerce in the region. It holds the key to bring together the countries of Central Asia, lending new impetus to Pakistan China relations,” the president said.

He traced the history of development of Gwadar and how the PPP leaders Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto envisioned it.

The president highlighted the strategic significance of the port for China and central Asian republics and its potential for integrating the economies of the countries in the region. The Chinese provinces of Xinjiang and Tibet are closer to Pakistani ports than to the ports in China, the president added. He said that the development of a trade corridor linking Xinjiang to the Middle East via Gwadar Port held ‘huge promise’.

Though Federal Minister for Ports and Shipping Babar Khan Ghori could not attend the ceremony, the president lauded his efforts in facilitating the transfer of port operations to China.

The president said that nearly 60% of China’s crude oil was imported from the gulf countries. Because of the proximity of those countries to Gwadar, the oil flow to China would be greatly facilitated by the operation of this port, he said. Expressing sorrow and grief over the Quetta bombing, he said ‘as we fight the menace of militancy, the march for progress and development will also continue’.

The Pakistani cabinet approved the transfer of Gwadar, currently a commercial failure cut off from the national road network, from PSA International to a state-owned Chinese company on January 30.

The deal offered China an energy and trade corridor that would connect it to the Arabian Sea and Strait of Hormuz, a gateway for a third of the world oil trade.

Experts say it would cut thousands of kilometres off the distance which oil and gas imports from Africa and the Middle East have to make to reach China.

China paid 75 percent of the initial $250 million used to build the port but in 2007 PSA International won a 40-year operating lease.

Then president Pervez Musharraf was reportedly unwilling to upset Washington by giving control of the port to the Chinese.

On February 6 Indian Defence Minister AK Antony said New Delhi was concerned by Pakistan’s decision to transfer management of the deep-sea port to China, which has interests in a string of other ports encircling India. However, spokesman for the Foreign Office last week said that it was bilateral arrangement between Pakistan and China and no one needs to be concerned about it.

China takes over Gwadar Port operations | The Nation

 

[LIAO]

“Then president Pervez Musharraf was reportedly unwilling to upset Washington by giving control of the port to the Chinese.”

relly？

 

[Windjammer]

ARY reporting that Iran in principal has agreed to set up an oil refinery in Gwadar. !!

 

[muse]

“Then president Pervez Musharraf was reportedly unwilling to upset Washington by giving control of the port to the Chinese.”

relly？

No not really - Musharraf is no longer President, therefore all evil, all shortcomings,are the responsibility of Musharraf - how much of it is the truth?, not much.

 

[azfar]

Gwadar News

 

[nitetrogen70]

Insight with Saleem Bukhari – 3rd March 2013 - Iran gas pipeline & Gwadar port
deep analysis of the importance of gwadar port and future projects linked to it

people saying Pakistan will be the gate way/ energy hub of Asia

 

[darkinsky]

Nadra implements IBMS at Gwadar airport


Islamabad:

The National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) has implemented integrated border management system (IBMS) at Gwadar International Airport and new land border Gabadt.

According to Nadra spokesperson, Nadra Chairman Tariq Malik has said that the authority has converted huge amount of manual legacy data into digital information to crack down illegal immigration. “We have built capacity of FIA and helped them so that they can help themselves by making using of state-of-art technology to do their core job - combating human trafficking and international terrorism,” he said.

The system is designed and tailored specifically as per immigration laws of Pakistan, which helps prevent illegal entry, use of counterfeit documents, human smuggling, and other travel fraud. IBMS is now operational at Pak-Iran border. Nadra is the partner for the implementation of IBMS for Federal Immigration Authority to replace the existing PISCES system at all the entry and exist points including airport, railway stations and land routes.

IBMS is already operational on all major international airports including Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Quetta. NADRA also implemented IBMS and land border between Pak-Afghan border at Torkham, and rail route between Pakistan-India at Khorapar. It has been designed to document and store the entire process starting from visa issuance till departure and arrivals from the country thus preventing illegal human trafficking as well as illegal immigrants to flee from the country. IBMS has been equipped with the latest technologies like advance fingerprint matching, digital facial recognition system, specialized handling for different categories of travellers.

 

[darkinsky]

A step forward: Pakistan, Iran to sign MoU for oil refinery on March 11

By Zafar Bhutta / Creative: Jamal Khurshid
Published: March 5, 2013

400,000 bpd will be the capacity of the refinery to be set up by Iran. ILLUSTRATION: JAMAL KHURSHID


ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and Iran are preparing to sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for setting up the country’s largest oil refinery costing $4 billion at the Gwadar Port on March 11, a project that will not only meet Pakistan’s refining needs but will also open avenues for China to get oil supplies.



Iran will set up an oil complex at the Gwadar Port, which will have the oil refinery. According to the original plan, Tehran will also lay an oil pipeline from its territory to Gwadar to transport crude oil for processing.
“If Pakistan and Iran succeed in completing the oil refinery and the pipeline, it may prompt China to revive its projects of establishing an oil refinery in Gwadar and laying an oil pipeline from Gwadar to western China to get oil supplies,” an official told The Express Tribune.

During the tenure of previous government, China had expressed interest in joining the Iran-Pakistan (IP) gas pipeline project, but did not push ahead with the plan following handover of Gwadar Port operations to Singapore Port Authority, the official said.


Now that China has taken over operations at the port, it may reinitiate the projects including oil and gas pipelines.


According to sources, the oil refinery that will be established by Iran may serve as an alternative to Khalifa refinery, which was planned to be built with the assistance of UAE’s state-run International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC). The Khalifa project got bogged down after controversy erupted over the extension in tenure of managing director of Pak-Arab Refinery Company (Parco), a joint venture between the governments of Pakistan and UAE’s emirate of Abu Dhabi.


Islamabad and Tehran are set to launch the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline project on March 11 on their border. On the occasion, they will also sign an MoU for setting up the oil refinery.


During a trip to Islamabad on February 20, Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Ghasemi had agreed to build Pakistan’s largest refinery at the Gwadar Port with a refining capacity of 400,000 barrels per day in a joint venture with oil marketing giant Pakistan State Oil (PSO). Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf has given the go-ahead to signing the MoU.


China’s coastal refinery plan is part of its programme to invest $12 billion in multiple projects in Pakistan. The refinery will have the processing capacity of 60,000 barrels of crude oil per day.
Pakistan and China had also considered a feasibility study for the oil pipeline from Gwadar to western China for transporting oil from the Persian Gulf. But the proposal was shelved after Beijing’s refusal to set up the oil refinery, sources said.


Former president Pervez Musharraf had also coined the idea of a trade corridor to meet Beijing’s energy needs and offered help for constructing a strategic pipeline from Gwadar to China’s border for supply of oil from Saudi Arabia.


China is heavily reliant on oil supply from the Gulf states, which currently comes through a very long route, via the Strait of Malacca.
Oil first reaches Shanghai, or the Chinese east coast, and then covers thousands of miles to reach the west of China. However, “the Gwadar refinery can provide a much safer, cheaper and shorter route to the west of China for oil transportation through Karakoram Highway,” a senior official said.


So far, the biggest chunk of Chinese investment in Pakistan has gone to development projects in Balochistan including Saindak copper and gold project in Chagai and lead-zinc mining project in Lasbela.
“The coastal oil refinery project may also create scores of employment opportunities for the local people,” the official remarked.

 

[darkinsky]

Rs13,527m spent on construction of Gwadar port link roads


Wednesday, March 06, 2013 - Islamabad—The Government has spent a total of Rs 13527 million on the construction of link roads to Gwadar Port in last five years, Minister for Communication Dr Arbab Alamgir told Senate on Tuesday.

In a written reply to the question of Ms Nuzhat Sadiq, he said Rs 3854 million had been spent on the construction of N-10, N-85,and M-8 linking Gwadar with rest of the country in 2008-9, Rs 3738 million in 2009-10, Rs 1946 million in 2010-11, Rs 1630 million during 2011-12 and 2359 million during 2012-13. He said Rs 1 billion has been allocated for providing comprehensive foolproof security and creation of dedicated wing of Frontier Constabulary for providing security to contractors and labour.

National Highway Authority (NHA) has planned the construction of another 110 km long Baisma-Khuzdar road (N-30) for providing connectivity to Gwadar port. NHA has planned the construction of seven roads for providing connectivity to Gwadar Port, he said.

Three roads have already been completed including 653 km Lyari- Ormara-Gwadar-Gabd road (N-10). Another 35 km M-8 from Khuzdar- Khori road has also been completed. Another 61 km (M-8) Quba Saeed Khan-Ratodero road. While 73 percent Khori-Quba Saeed Khan road has been completed.

Prime Minister has approved mobilization of Frontier Works Organisation (FWO) on Gwadar-Turbat-Hoshab. 22 percent of 459 lm long Hoshab-Basima-Sorab (N-85) has also been completed. 196 km long Gwadar-Turbat-Hoshab has been completed 68 percent.