South Korea will conduct a feasibility study for a new railway connecting Vientiane in Laos and southern Vietnam.
The proposed track would link the Lao capital and Vung Tau in Vietnam. The study will be paid for by a US$3 million grant from the Korea International Cooperation Agency, to be completed in 2017, the Vientiane Times reported on Monday.
The 500 kilometre track would run through Borikhamxay and Khammouane province to Vung Tao, a major deepwater port in southern Vietnam.
Officials of the Korea Rail Network Authority and Seoul University held talks with their Lao counterparts including Sompong Pholsena, the director-general of the Laos Railway Department, on July 15 on the implementation of the study, it said.
The Korean delegation is in Vietnam until Wednesday and will meet Vietnamese Transport Ministry officials and make a field trip to central Vietnam where the line could pass through, the newspaper added.
China will invest in a railway line from the Chinese border to Vientiane. The line from China will connect to the Thai rail system in Nong Khai province.
Laos has awarded a contract to a Malaysian firm, Giant Consolidated, to build another line from Savannakhet, opposite Thailand's Mukdahan province, to Lao Bao on the border with Vietnam. But the project is behind schedule.
The railway network is a policy of the Lao government to transform the country from a landlocked to land-linked nation in mainland Southeast Asia.