DUSHANBE (TCA) — A delegation from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is heading to China to participate in the first Annual Meeting of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and to sign a joint project, a reconstruction of a road in Tajikistan, one of the first ever AIIB projects.
The Dushanbe road project will be discussed by the AIIB Board of Directors, and, following approval, this US $55 million co-investment will be signed on Saturday, 25 June, at the AIIB Annual Meeting, the EBRD press office said.
The Beijing-based AIIB was inaugurated in January this year, in the same month that China became the 67th shareholder of the EBRD. The EBRD President, Sir Suma Chakrabarti, attended the inauguration ceremony. From the inception of the AIIB, the EBRD has offered cooperation and support to the newly created multilateral bank, which has some areas of operations in common with the EBRD.
The first joint project with the AIIB is one of several milestones in the EBRD’s cooperation with China. In addition to accepting China as its newest shareholder country, the EBRD has agreed to foster operational and institutional cooperation with the Silk Road Fund (a memorandum of understanding was signed last week).
The EBRD also held a conference in Trieste, Italy, last month, dedicated to boosting Chinese investment in the Western Balkans. The EBRD and AIIB are working on a number of new joint projects.
The EBRD is also in talks with other Chinese institutions about ways of boosting Chinese participation in development finance in the EBRD region, which stretches from Morocco to Mongolia and covers much of the New Silk Road outlined for infrastructure investment by China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
