U.S.-funded Bannu-Miran Shah-Ghulam Khan Road Opens

U.S.-funded Bannu-Miran Shah-Ghulam Khan Road Opens

Al-Bab Report

Islamabad, November 15, 2016 – The American Embassy congratulates the people of Pakistan, the FATA Secretariat and the Frontier Works Organization on the opening of the Bannu-Miran Shah-Ghulam Khan road inaugurated today by Pakistani Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif.  The United States is proud to have partnered with the Pakistani government to restore key trade routes between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The Bannu-Miran Shah-Ghulam Khan road was constructed with 8.7 billion rupees of funding from the United States Government through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).  The 82-kilometer road, which is one of the four major cross-border trade routes between Pakistan and Afghanistan, facilitates access from Bannu in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province to Miran Shah in North Waziristan Agency of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), and onwards to Ghulam Khan, which borders Afghanistan.

                                                                     

“This road symbolizes and is a benefit of the partnership between Pakistan and America.  Together, we are helping to fulfill the Pakistani goal of restoring public infrastructure in remote communities…  To date, America has funded the construction and rehabilitation of over 1100 kilometers of roads in Pakistan, through similar gifts… These partnerships demonstrate our long-term commitment to Pakistan’s people, prosperity, and stability,” said American Ambassador David Hale in a video message for the event. 

USAID partnered with the FATA Secretariat and the Frontier Works Organization to complete the road.