DUSHANBE, December 2, 2014, Asia-Plus — The Kulma border-crossing checkpoint on the Tajik-Chinese border in the Gorno Badakhshan Autonomous Region (GBAO) has made shift to a winter operation schedule.
An official source at the Customs Service under the Government of Tajikistan says that although Tajikistan and China reached an agreement on a year-round operation of the Kulma border-crossing checkpoint, the Chinese has decided to set a floating operation schedule for the crossing during the winter period.
The decision has reportedly been made following cold weather and heavy snowfalls reported in the Kulma area.
“Under the winter operation schedule, the crossing will work ten days in December (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 22, 23, 24, 25, and 26), six days in January (5, 6, 7, 19, 20, and 21), six days in February (2, 3, 4, 11, 12, and 13), six days in March (2, 3, 4, 17, 18, and 19) and three days in April (7, 8, and 9)” the source said.
We will recall that Tajikistan and China reached an agreement on a year-round operation of the Kulma border-crossing checkpoint in December 2011. Under the agreement signed in Dushanbe on December 29, 2011, a status of international crossing was given to the Kulma border-crossing checkpoint.
Since May 1, 2008, the Kulma crossing operated every day, except weekends, from May through November.
Opened in 2004, the Tajik-China trade route runs from Khorog, the capital of Gorno Badakhshan in southeastern Tajikistan, over a high-altitude plateau and then down into China, where it ends in the city of Kashgar, 700 kilometers away.
As conditions are so tough at the Kulma border crossing, which is located on a mountain pass 4,400 meters high, until May 1 2008, the gateway had stayed open only 15 days out of every month, while from November through April it had been closed altogether.
