'No obstacle' to Lao-China rail link, minister says
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Vientiane - There are "no obstacles" to Laos' planned high-speed rail link from China, the transport minister was quoted as saying Thursday, days after the Asian Development Bank called the project "unaffordable" for the developing nation.
Construction on the 7-billion-dollar, 421-kilometre Chinese-Lao railway "would begin shortly after all parties had reached an agreement and all preparations were complete," the Vientiane Times quoted Minister of Public Works and Transport Sommath Pholsena assaying.
The ADB called for caution, noting the cost was 80 per cent of Laos' annual national budget.
"For the Asian Development Bank and many others, the cost is unaffordable for Laos to take on, even at very concessional rates," the international lender's Thailand director Craig Steffensen said Tuesday.
Sommath said "the details have not been agreed upon" for the start date and financing.
Laos is to finance the project with a loan from China's EXIM Bank of China.//DPA
