India seeks to join APTA project

India’s ambassador to Kabul in an interview with Ariananews said that it will be in interest of the three countries if New Delhi includes to Afghanistan Pakistan Transit Agreement (APTA) project.

Indian officials are said to believe if the APTA project shares with India, Afghanistan’s exports will expand.

“Nearly 45 percent of Afghanistan’s goods export to India. If the accord becomes a tripartite agreement it will cause the growth of Afghanistan economy,” Amar Sinha, India’s ambassador to Kabul said.

Afghanistan and Pakistan have agreed to enforce a long-awaited transit trade deal that would help war-ravaged Afghanistan boost its economy.

Pakistan has long expressed its concern over smuggling into Pakistan of goods being imported by Afghanistan.

To ensure the consignments reach Afghanistan and not smuggled back to Pakistan, Pakistan sought bank guarantees from Afghan importers.

Afghanistan praised India’s offer in joining the treaty but Pakistan is opposed to it.

India also noted that no contract was signed with Afghan officials on Hajigak mining project.

Earlier this week, reports came out that a consortium led by the Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) scrapped the Hajigak iron ore project, which was worth USD 10bn.

A number of analysts linked the decision of the Consortium to President Ashraf Ghani’s pro-Pakistan foreign policy in particularly to the signing of an intelligence agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan.