Narrative
Full Description
Project narrative
On April 20, 2017, China and Afghanistan signed an agreement for implementation of the Wakhan Corridor Fiber Optic Project (in Pashto: د واخان دهلیز نوري فايبر پروژې), which entails the installment of a 480 km fiber optic line connecting the Chinese city of Kashgar with the Afghan city of Faizabad via the Wakhan corridor. In August 2018, the Government of Afghanistan approved a survey for 170km of this fiber optic line. Afghanistan requested 50 million USD of funding from China, and China is covering the costs of implementation. It appears that Afghanistan's Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Technology will oversee the project. The project is under the plan of "Digital Silk Plan". 2017 saw the signing of two MOUs for expansion of the Optical Fiber Cable connecting Afghanistan, China, the Kyrgyz Republic, and Tajikistan, and a new MOU is expected to be signed at RECCA-VII by Turkmenistan , Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
Staff comments
The funding secured from an IDA Grant via the World Bank for the Afghanistan Digital CASA Project is USD 51 million. Documents related to the Digital CASA Project indicate that the scope of the project may include fiber optic links with China through the Wakhan Border. It is unclear if the financing is being channeled through the World Bank. While a September 2018 article from the Afghanistan Ministry of Communications and Information Technology reports that the Government of China would wholly fund the implementation of the project at a cost of USD 70 million, the more conservative transaction is recorded.