India and Iran Reach Final Agreement on Chabahar Port

India and Iran have reached long term agreement on the Chabahar Port project. This new agreement will replace the original contract that was entered into earlier, which only covers India’s operations at the ShahidBeheshti terminal in the Chabahar port and was being renewed every year. The new agreement has a validity of ten years and will be automatically extended.

In an update on January 15^th,Jaishankar said on X that he began his engagements in Tehran by meeting Minister of Roads and Urban Development MehrdadBazrpash. “Detailed and productive discussion on establishing a long-term cooperation framework with respect to Chabahar port. Also exchanged views on the International North-South Transport Corridor,” he added.

In order to boost regional trade India has been pushing for the Chabahar port project, especially for its connectivity to Afghanistan since 2016, when the sub-continent signed a tripartite agreement with Iran and the now Taliban-led nation to develop the terminal. The Chabahar port is also seen as a key hub for the INSTC project. In the year 2021, at a connectivity conference in Tashkent, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar had projected the Chabahar port as a key regional transit hub, with potential for connectivity to Afghanistan. In November 2023, Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra discussed with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in November last year on ways to boost connectivity through strategic Chabahar port and the current situation in West Asia arising out of the Hamas-Israel conflict.

India has been on the job of developing stakes in the ChabaharPort as a gateway for Indian goods to reach Afghanistan bypassing Pakistan. India also planned to cooperate with Iran in constructing the railway line from the Chabhar port to Afghan border. But cooperation with the Iranian railway on building the railway line to Afghan border ran into rough weather. The Indian terminal at Chabahar port operational for the past several years ran into rough weather due to imposition of US sanctions on Iran. Even purchasing cranes for the Indian terminal became a problem since the international banks declined to lend due to the sanctions on Iran.