34% work of Lowari Tunnel completed

ISLAMABAD—Thirty-four per cent work of Rs 8 billion Lowari Tunnel project on Nowshera-Dir-Chitral Road (N-45) has been completed and it is hoped the project would be completed by September next year, a source in National Highway Authority (NHA) told APP on Monday. The source said that 66 per cent work of 9 kilometers each access roads on both sides of the tunnel has also been completed. The 8.6 km-long rail tunnel will provide all-weather communication linkage to the Chitral Valley, which remains cut off with the other parts of the country during winter and also facilitate Pakistan’s link with land-locked Central Asian state of Tajikistan via a narrow strip of Afghanistan.With its completion distance between Peshawar and Chitral would be reduced to five or six hours from 12 or 14 hours,he added. Work on the project started in 2005 and was formally inaugurated by President Pervez Musharraf in July 2006. A Korean firm is constructing around 9 kilometers long, 7.5 m wide and 7m high tunnel. The source said the project would be completed in two phases. In the first phase tunnel would be constructed while in the second phase a railway track would be laid, he added. He said it would be the biggest freight tunnel in Asia, adding the project is a joint venture between Korean firm SAMBU with Pakistani firms. It was more than 45 years, when first feasibility was taken up by the Government in 1955 and the first construction was undertaken under the Frontier Works Organization in 1975.FWO carried out tunneling operation upto 500 meters but the project was abandoned due to financial constraints. —Agencies