The train, also referred to as Silk Road train, has passed through Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan to Iran, travelling a distance of 10,399 kilometers.
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The Silk Road (or Silk Route) is an ancient trans-Asian trade route connecting China to Europe and the Mediterranean Sea.
It took just 14 days for the 32-container train loaded with Chinese goods to complete the 5,900 mile (9,500km) journey from China’s eastern Zhejiang province through Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.
“The revival of the Silk Road is crucial for the countries on its route”, he said at a ceremony at Tehran’s rail station attended by the ambassadors of China and Turkmenistan.
“The arrival of this train in less than 14 days is unprecedented”, said Mohsen Pourseyed Aqayi, the head of the Iranian railway company. In addition to economic trade, the Silk Road served as a means of carrying out cultural trade among the civilizations along its network.
The train had left China from the trading hub of Yiwu in the northwestern province of Xinjiang on 29 January.
That’s 30 days shorter than the usual trip by sea from Shanghai to Iran’s Bandar Abbas port. The link between Yiwu to Tehran on the road is the latest move from the China-backed initiative to revive the ancient Silk Road that flourished a thousand years ago, and was used by traders from both the East and West.
More than one-third of Iran’s foreign trade is with China.
Silk Road extending from Europe through Egypt, Somalia, the Arabian Peninsula, Iran, Central Asia, India/Pakistan, Java-Indonesia, and Vietnam until it reaches China.
Tehran will not be the final destination of these kinds of trains from China, the Iranian deputy minister said, adding that in the future, the train will reach Europe.
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Back in 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed a project namely “Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Maritime Silk Road” aimed at establishing wider logistics networks.
