Iran, Azerbaijan to Increase Truck Traffic at Astara Border

Iran and Azerbaijan have agreed to raise daily truck movements at the Astara border crossing to between 350 and 400 vehicles.

This move is aimed at reducing congestion and facilitating exports and transit flows, according to Iranian officials, The Caspian Post reports, citing Iranian media.

Javad Hedayati, director general for transit and international transport at Iran’s Road Maintenance and Transportation Organization, said the agreement followed a phone conversation by Iran’s transport and urban development minister, who chairs the joint Iran-Azerbaijan economic committee, and subsequent visits by delegations from Tehran and Baku to the border.

Hedayati said measures taken in recent years to improve logistics infrastructure at Astara had helped support higher traffic volumes. These include construction of a second bridge linking Iran and Azerbaijan, development of the border hinterland and the launch of a virtual queuing system for trucks.

He said data show annual transit traffic through the Astara terminal has risen by around 20 to 25 percent in recent years.

Hedayati also pointed to a series of bilateral and trilateral border meetings held this year involving Iran, Azerbaijan and Russia, aimed at accelerating the movement of export and transit trucks.

He said the outcomes were already reflected in Azerbaijan’s higher acceptance of Iranian and transit fleets.

“If this process continues, most of the trucks currently halted at Astara will soon be dispatched to their final destinations,” he said.

Congestion at the Astara crossing typically intensifies each year ahead of the New Year holidays and for up to two months afterward, largely due to a seasonal surge in exports of off-season agricultural and horticultural products to Eurasian markets, particularly Russia.

In mid-October, Iran’s Minister of Roads and Urban Development, Farzaneh Sadegh, announced that Iran, Russia, and Azerbaijan have finalized a comprehensive roadmap to increase the volume of goods transiting among the three nations to 15 million tons annually. The plan, she said, marks a major milestone in efforts to strengthen regional connectivity through the International North-South Transit Corridor (INSTC).