Afghanistan–Uzbekistan Friendship Bridge

An Afghan Border Police officer standing on the Afghan side of the Afghanistan–Uzbekistan Friendship Bridge.

The Afghanistan–Uzbekistan Friendship Bridge is a road and rail bridge across the river Amu Darya, connecting the town of Hairatan in the northern Balkh province of Afghanistan with Termez in the Surxondaryo Region of Uzbekistan.^[1] The bridge was built by the Soviet Union and opened in 1982^[2] to supply its troops in Afghanistan.

OverviewEdit

It is the only fixed link across the Uzbek–Afghan border, located some 75 km north of the city of Mazar-i-Sharif. The nearest other bridge across the Amu Darya is some 120 kilometers (74.5 mi) to the west, a pipeline bridge crossing the Turkmen–Afghan border from/to the Lebap Region.

The bridge was closed in May 1997 when Taliban forces attacked the city of Mazar-i-Sharif, and Uzbekistan feared a spreading of the disturbances to their own country. It reopened on December 9, 2001.^[3] Work began in January 2010 to extend the railway to Mazar-i-Sharif,^[4] which was completed in November of the same year.