With Iran’s southern ports subject to a United States naval blockade, Tehran is looking for alternatives to export oil and import goods.
asserted
Tehran → look → goods
The Caspian Sea on Iran’s northern coast is seen as one portal for Iran to the outside world.
asserted
Sea → see → world
Recent efforts at the United Nations to end the deadlock between Iran and the US appear to have failed as US President Donald Trump said Tehran’s offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz was unacceptable.
asserted
offer → end → Hormuz
With no breakthrough in sight on ending the war launched by the US and Israel on Iran on February 28, Tehran is making adjustments to export oil and import essential goods.
asserted
Tehran → end → goods
But maritime trade via the Caspian Sea has its own logistical challenges, experts said.
asserted
experts → have → challenges
The Caspian Sea, the world’s largest landlocked body of water, is shared by Iran, Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.
asserted
Sea → share → Iran
Shipping on the sea has been increasingly challenged by declining water levels in recent years.
asserted
Shipping → challenge → years
In April, UN Environment Programme Executive Director Inger Andersen said Caspian water levels had dropped by about 2 metres (6.6ft) since the 1990s.
asserted
levels → say → 1990s
Sea levels are projected to recede by an additional 8 to 21 metres (26ft to 69ft) by the end of the century.
asserted
levels → project → century
Shahram Fadakar, director general of the Iranian Department of Environment’s Office for Coastal and Marine Ecosystem Protection, told local media last week that water levels have been dropping by more than 20cm (7.9 inches) annually over the past two to three years.
asserted
levels → tell → years
This could affect trade between all Caspian countries, including Iran.
uncertain
This → affect → Iran
This month, Masoud Polmeh, secretary-general of the Shipping Association of Iran, told state-linked media that Iran’s northern ports could once handle berth vessels weighing up to 6,000 tonnes.
uncertain
ports → tell → tonnes
Due to reduced water levels, they can now handle only 4,000-tonne vessels.
asserted
they → reduce → vessels
Iranian ships entering the Caspian Sea via Russia’s Volga River have become stuck due to low water levels, sometimes remaining stationary for days and weeks at a time before their crews are rescued.
“Fortunately, that hasn’t happened in our ports,” Polmeh added.
asserted
Polmeh → enter → ports
The vast majority of Iran’s maritime trade has been conducted via its southern ports, but the US naval embargo and air strikes on infrastructure are forcing Tehran to shift trade to the Caspian Sea and its land borders.
asserted
embargo → conduct → Sea
While there are currently no active military attacks against interests in the north, Vali Kaleji, an independent writer and researcher in Iran on Russia, Central Asia and the Caucasus, said changes in logistical operations have put huge strains on Iran’s land borders.
asserted
changes → be → borders
At the Norduz border crossing with Armenia, as many as 1,800 trucks queue for several days at a time to enter Iran.
asserted
trucks → queue → Iran
At other terminals, wait times range from 10 to 15 days to enter Iran although Kaleji said this is not due solely to freight shifting to Iran’s roads.
asserted
this → range → roads
“Limited terminal capacity, customs procedures, road infrastructure and ongoing construction projects have also contributed to the congestion.
asserted
capacity → contribute → congestion
Meanwhile, sanctions on Iranian airlines and the resulting influx of passengers towards Iran’s land borders with Armenia and Turkey have further exacerbated problems at the border terminals,” Kaleji told Al Jazeera.
asserted
Kaleji → result → Jazeera
The eastern Caspian rail route provides a connection for transporting Iranian cargo to Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and China.
asserted
route → provide → Turkmenistan
But Iran’s rail freight connections with the South Caucasus region, which were severed during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War from 1988 to 1994, remain closed.
asserted
which → sever → 1994
“The revival of the Julfa-Nakhchivan railway route, part of the Soviet-era railway network in the South Caucasus, also depends on the peace process between Armenia and Azerbaijan, particularly the implementation of the TRIPP project,” Kaleji said, referring to a US-supported transit corridor in the region.
“Since a major share of transit and trade along the western route of the North-South Transport Corridor takes place through this route, the absence of a railway connection between Iran and the South Caucasus remains a major obstacle to accelerating and increasing the volume of trade and transit, particularly under conditions of intensified maritime blockade in the south.
asserted
absence → depend → south
Trade obstacles
Iranian authorities have not provided details on which commodities and at what volume trade has been directed northwards, including to the Caspian ports of Anzali, Amirabad and Nowshahr.
asserted
trade → provide → Anzali
Last month, Ports and Maritime Organization chief Mohammad Shakibi-Nasab told state-linked media that Iran’s total nominal port capacity was 300 million tonnes, only 30 million tonnes of which is linked to its northern ports.
asserted
tonnes → tell → ports
The northern ports’ share of essential goods transport has gone up from 18 percent in the years before the US-Israel war on Iran to 30 percent today.
asserted
share → go → percent
There are stark differences between maximum loads carried by vessels using Iran’s northern and southern ports, he said.
asserted
he → be → ports
One vessel in the south could potentially carry the cargo of 20 ships travelling on the Caspian Sea.
uncertain
vessel → carry → Sea
In early September, Hadi Haghshenas, the governor of the northern province of Gilan, said container arrivals at Caspian ports had increased by 50 percent year-on-year during the five Iranian calendar months that ended on August 22.
asserted
that → say → August
He also said, unlike the Port of Shahid Rajaei in southern Iran, the northern ports were closer to major cities in central Iran, such as Tehran, Isfahan and Arak.
asserted
ports → say → Tehran
That proximity could help bring down land transport costs for imports reaching end users.
uncertain
proximity → bring → users
The China-Aktau-northern Iran route, which takes cargo by rail from China across Kazakhstan to Aktau, then by ship to Caspian ports and into Iran by road, could expand regional trade, Haghshenas added.
uncertain
Haghshenas → take → trade
The Iranian government is trying to complete the missing sections of the Rasht-Astara railway, a strategically important project with Russia.
asserted
government → try → Russia
This would complete the western rail branch of the International North-South Transport Corridor, which passes through Iran, Azerbaijan and Russia.
asserted
which → complete → Iran
Tehran’s northwards shift risks an overreliance on Russia as a trading partner and exposure to the vulnerabilities of sanctions that have come with Moscow’s war on Ukraine.
asserted
that → risk → Ukraine
US media have reported that Russia has sent drone components and explosives to Iran via the Caspian Sea.
asserted
Russia → report → Sea
There have also been claims that some transferred Russian technology may be aimed at helping Iran develop advanced supersonic cruise missiles.
uncertain
Iran → transfer → missiles
Iranian and Russian authorities have said they want to expand their military cooperation but did not comment on the latest media reports.
asserted
they → say → reports
While Iran’s Caspian region has been less heavily targeted in US-Israeli attacks, Ukraine did attack what Tehran said was an Iranian fishing vessel in July, killing one civilian.
asserted
Tehran → target → civilian
Ukraine said it was a Russian military ship carrying military cargo to Iran.
asserted
it → say → Iran
…and 9 more, not listed.
The Aporia
