Iranian President Hassan Rouhani inaugurated the first phase of Chabahar Port on Sunday.
For India, the Iranian port is strategically important. That’s why New Delhi has committed USD 500 million to this project. The port will allow India to bypass Pakistan on trade route to Afghanistan and other Central Asian countries. India, Iran and Afghanistan had signed an agreement to grant preferential treatment and tariff reductions at Chabahar to Indian goods headed toward Central Asia and the war-torn South Asian nation.
The Iranian state media reported that President Rouhani inaugurated a part of the port, called Shahid Beheshti Port, and it is the West Asian country’s only oceanic port. The ceremony was attended by ministers, envoys and officials from 17 countries, including Indian Minister of State for Shipping Pon Radhakrishnan. IRNA also reported that India would use two berths of the port.

Meanwhile, President Rouhani said that the inauguration marked a “historic” day for Iran, stressing: “This port is also significant from the political point of view given that it connects Iran with its eastern and northern neighbours and at a later stage to European states.” He informed the foreign dignitaries that the port would become fully operational by the end of 2018.
Just a day before the inauguration, Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj made a surprise visit to Tehran. Swaraj, who was returning from the Russian city of Sochi after attending the annual summit of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation, met her Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif and discussed the project. Later, Zarif said: “It also shows the importance of the port in the development of the region.”

Weeks before the inauguration, a senior Afghan leader said that his country would no longer need to depend on Pakistan for transit trade. “Afghanistan used to rely only on one transit road, which was through Karachi. That is not the case anymore. (Now), it’s (also) through Chabahar,” said Afghan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah. However, Islamabad has accused India of trying to use Afghanistan as a base to destabilise Pakistan.

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Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das