Construction of a section of a highway, running from Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, to Bangkok, capital of Thailand, will start this year, sources announced Thursday in Kunming at a provincial meeting on transport work.
The Simao-Xiaomengyang highway section is 97 kilometers long. Its construction plan has been approved by the Chinese Ministry of Communications.
The Kunming-Bangkok highway, a high-grade road running through Laos, is an important part of a highway network to be built in Asia. The governments of China, Laos and Thailand signed an agreement to build the highway in the year 2000.
The section of the highway in Yunnan is 704 kilometers long, running from Kunming to Mohan port on the border between China and Laos. Most of the section has been upgraded or newly built.
The last section of the Kunming-Bangkok highway in Yunnan, 211 kilometers long from Xiaomengyang to Mohan port, is expected to be completed by 2006, said Li Yuguang, director of the provincial traffic bureau.
Li disclosed that work on the Laos section of the Kunming-Bangkok highway, which will be built with the help of China, is expected to start next year.
(People's Daily February 8, 2002)
