HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK ---------------------------Six Countries Sign Corridor No. 8 Memorandum
The transport corridor is defined as including ports, highways, railroads, airports and traffic management facilities. [Balkan Times photo]
(Various sources - 10/09/02)
A memorandum of understanding on the development of the Pan-European Corridor No.8 was signed on 9 September in the Italian port city of Bari, on the Adriatic. The document, signed by the transport ministers of Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Macedonia and Turkey, defines the route of the corridor, which will link Europe with the countries of the Caucasus and Central Asia.
The memorandum stresses the corridor's importance for the overall social and economic development of the region, including the process of European integration, as well as the expansion of mutual co-operation. It also sets out the general technical rules to be applied in development of the transport infrastructure, the exchange of information and the construction stages, as well as measures to facilitate the work in cross-border regions and the framework conditions for private participation in the development and exploitation of the corridor.
Corridor No.8 has a total length of between 1,220 km and 1,350 km depending on the specific features of the component highways and railroads. Starting from the Adriatic at Bari/Brindisi, its main route runs across Albania, Macedonia and Bulgaria, linking Durres/Vlora with Tirana, Skopje, Kafasan, Sofia, Plovdiv and Burgas/Varna on the Black Sea.
The corridor is part of the Pan-European network of ten transport corridors, and crosses or partly coincides with the routes of three other corridors – nos. 4, 9 and 10. For example, the Sofia-Plovdiv section of Corridor No. 8 lies also on the route of Corridor No. 4, and ensures a direct link between Nis and Istanbul on the route of Corridor No. 10. In Macedonia, Corridor No. 8 crosses the main route of Corridor No. 10.
Corridor No. 8 is multi-componential and includes all ports, highways, railroads and airports, as well as other components pertaining to the transport infrastructure, such as the service facilities for managing traffic.
Slightly more than half of the corridor's route runs across Bulgaria, and most of the necessary road and railway infrastructure is in place. Only a railroad from the Gyueshevo railway station to the Bulgarian-Macedonian border has not been constructed yet. One-third of the 206 km Macedonian section of the corridor is already in place. An estimated $400m is required for construction of the needed infrastructure, including a road ringing Skopje.
The initiative for the development of this "West-East" transport corridor along the Italy-Albania-Macedonia-Bulgaria line, connecting with the Caucasus and the Middle East dates back to 1990. It was set down first in a November 1991 meeting of the transport ministers of Albania, Macedonia and Bulgaria held in Sofia. Subsequently, Italy and Turkey joined the initiative, as did Greece at a later stage. The decision for the development of Corridor No. 8 was confirmed at the second Pan-European conference of the ministers of transport in Crete in 1994, and was re-confirmed at the third conference in 1997.
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