French President Emmanuel Macron has appointed the former head of gas company Engie as its special envoy for a multinational project to build railways and ports connecting the Middle East and South Asia, described as an alternative to China’s Belt and Road initiative.
By appointing Gerard Mestrallet, an energy industry veteran, Macron wants “France to become a key player in this project” and ensure French companies are best positioned in the early stages of the project, his office said on Monday.
The India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) was launched on the sidelines of the G20 summit in New Delhi last September and is part of Washington and Brussels’ plan to counter China’s flagship global infrastructure project.
According to US and European officials, it is designed to link Middle Eastern countries by rail and connect them to India by port links, which would reduce transport time, costs and fuel consumption and help energy and trade flows from the Persian Gulf to Europe.
The European Union, India, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the United States and other G20 partners, signed the memorandum of understanding on IMEC.
According to the memorandum, IMEC will consist of two separate corridors: an eastern corridor connecting India to the Persian Gulf and a northern corridor connecting the Persian Gulf to Europe.
Along the railway route, the participants intend to lay a cable for power and data transmission lines and a pipeline for hydrogen produced from renewable energy sources for use in power generation.
