TEHRAN- According to the deputy head of Iran’s Ports and Maritime Organization (PMO) for ports and economic affairs, the trilateral agreement between Iran, India and Afghanistan on transit of goods via Iran’s southeastern port of Chabahar will be officially implemented on February 26, 2019.

As the official portal of the Transport Ministry quoted Mohammad-Ali Hassanzadeh as saying in an interview in a state-TV program on Saturday, the agreement’s implementation requires attraction of businessmen and launching direct shipping lines between Chabahar and India’s port, as well as other ports at the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman.
“The implementation has been started since a week ago and of course, some cargos had been transited from India to Afghanistan before that,” he said, “About 10 ships of wheat and beans, weighting 120,000 tons, have been transported from India to Afghanistan, previously.”
On October 23, Iran, India and Afghanistan inked an agreement on transit of goods via Chabahar.  
The agreement was signed in Tehran by Mohammad Rastad, the head of PMO, T.S. Tirumurti, the secretary of economic relations in India’s Ministry of External Affairs, and Imammohammad Warymoch, Afghanistan’s deputy minister of transport, during the first meeting of coordination council of agreement on the establishment of an international transport and transit corridor among Iran, India and Afghanistan (Chabahar Agreement).
These three countries signed a trilateral transit agreement in Tehran in May 2016, which allows them open new routes to connect among themselves via converting Chabahar Port into a transit hub bypassing Pakistan.
Accordingly, through Chabahar Port India can bypass Pakistan and transport goods to Afghanistan and Central Asia, while Afghanistan can get linked to India via sea.
The document was signed in the presence of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani.
HJ/MA