From Maritime Gateway to Strategic Corridor: Chabahar and the Emerging Geoeconomics of Eurasia

Abstract

The transformation of Chabahar from a maritime infrastructure project into a prospective strategic corridor illustrates the changing relationship between geography, connectivity and economic power in contemporary Eurasia. Located on Iran’s southeastern coast along the Gulf of Oman, Chabahar provides India with maritime access to Afghanistan and potentially to the wider markets of Central Asia and Russia while simultaneously linking into the International North–South Transport Corridor (INSTC), the Ashgabat Agreement and emerging regional transit arrangements. This article examines the evolution of Chabahar through the analytical lens of geoeconomics and argues that the strategic significance of the port cannot be understood solely through conventional maritime geopolitics or the India–China–Pakistan rivalry. Rather, Chabahar represents an emerging form of corridor power in which infrastructure, logistics, trade facilitation, investment, sanctions exposure, institutional coordination and political geography interact to reshape the distribution of connectivity across Eurasia. Drawing on a qualitative case-study methodology and an analysis of academic literature, official documents, policy material and recent developments, the article develops a conceptual framework linking maritime gateways to strategic corridors. It demonstrates that the value of Chabahar lies less in the physical port alone than in its capacity to connect maritime and continental networks and thereby alter the accessibility of landlocked and semi-landlocked markets. The study further argues that Chabahar’s geoeconomic potential is simultaneously enabled and constrained by the same characteristics that make it strategically significant. Its location creates route diversification, but its dependence on Iranian territory exposes it to sanctions and geopolitical risk; its integration into the INSTC expands its Eurasian relevance, but the corridor remains institutionally fragmented; and its potential to facilitate Central Asian trade is considerable, yet commercial viability depends on infrastructure quality, customs harmonization, predictable financing and sustained political commitment. The article concludes that Chabahar should be conceptualized not as a substitute for other Eurasian corridors but as a networked strategic node within a plural and increasingly competitive Eurasian connectivity order.