Ethiopia said Tuesday it reached an agreement with Sudan to build a railway line linking the two countries from Port Sudan to Ethiopia's southern-most town of Moyale, reported the BBC.online.
Ethiopian transport minister, Ato Mohammed Drir, said feasibility studies would be made to evaluate the better of two possible routes.
He said local and foreign partnerships would be sought to finance the project, which he estimated would cost the equivalent of about 1.5 billion dollars, according to the BBC.
According to IRIN.com, Dirir said that a study conducted by the Ethiopian Railway Development Initiative had offered two options for establishing the project: one was to construct 2,160 km of railway, at a cost of US $1.422 billion dollars, from Port Sudan to Moyale, through Shewako and Bikar within Sudan, and through Mekele, Dalol, Mille, Awash, Nazareth, Assela and Neghele in Ethiopia to the Kenyan border.
The second option, at a cost of US $1.5 billion dollars, would cover a distance of 2,240 km, said IRIN -- (Several Sources)
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