ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Friday called for an early start to Pakistan’s long-delayed Main Line-1 railway upgrade during talks with a senior Asian Development Bank official, as Islamabad moves ahead with multilateral financing for the first section of the project.

The roughly 1,700-km railway corridor from Karachi to Peshawar is the backbone of Pakistan’s rail network and has long been a major infrastructure project under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, or CPEC. The original plan envisaged Chinese concessional financing, but years of negotiations did not produce a financing package for the full project.

Pakistan is now working with the ADB on financing the roughly 480-km Karachi-Rohri section, while continuing to seek Chinese financing for remaining sections of ML-1. The government has said the decision to begin with multilateral financing was taken with Beijing’s consent and that Chinese financing could still be tapped in subsequent phases.

“A central focus of the discussions was the modernization of the Main Line-1 (ML-1) railway corridor from Karachi to Peshawar, a vital national infrastructure priority,” the Prime Minister’s Office said after Sharif hosted a breakfast meeting for ADB Vice President for South, Central and West Asia Yingming Yang.

Sharif said “upgrading ML-1 is essential for modernizing freight logistics, strengthening regional trade connectivity, and supporting major industrial initiatives,” according to the PMO statement.

The two sides discussed the need for an early groundbreaking of ML-1, the statement added, without announcing a financing agreement or construction date.

The ADB says it is considering a multitranche financing facility for the Karachi-Rohri section that would support upgrades to railway infrastructure, signaling and operations as well as institutional reforms. Its current project documentation lists a proposed $1.1 billion in ADB financing, comprising $1 billion from ordinary capital resources and $100 million in concessional lending, with other financing potentially required for the overall project.

Pakistan Railways Minister Hanif Abbasi said after meeting Yang on Wednesday that the Karachi-Rohri project was estimated to cost around $2.5 billion and that the government was committed to laying its foundation stone during the current fiscal year. He asked the ADB to expedite its approval process.

The ADB has already provided $10 million in project-readiness financing to support preparation for railway investment, including ML-1, while Pakistan and the bank have been working this year to complete documentation and other requirements for the Karachi-Rohri project.

The broader ML-1 upgrade has been delayed for years amid negotiations over its cost, scope and financing. Pakistan and China signed a framework agreement for the project in 2017 and the two countries subsequently established a financing committee to negotiate a Chinese concessional loan.

Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal said in July that Pakistan and China had agreed that ML-1 could ultimately draw on Chinese, Pakistani and multilateral financing. He said Islamabad considered it prudent to begin the project with ADB financing while Pakistan was simultaneously seeking annual rollovers of existing Chinese loans.

Pakistan is also exploring different financing options for subsequent portions of the railway. A government committee last week considered public investment, foreign financing, public-private partnerships, commercial bank lending and domestic capital markets for the Rohri-Multan section.

ML-1 carries the bulk of Pakistan Railways’ passenger and freight traffic, but aging tracks, signaling systems and other infrastructure have constrained speeds, capacity and safety. The ADB says upgrading the Karachi-Rohri section, which links the country’s main port city to the national network, is intended to improve freight movement, safety and regional connectivity.