Indonesia has picked China to build the country's first fast-train rail line linking the two cities. (Reuters photo)JAKARTA: Indonesia plans to extend a high-speed rail project being built with China and bring in Japanese investors, as part of 89 priority projects over four years, a minister said on Friday. The extension of the $6-billion Jakarta-Bandung rail project is among 1,422 trillion rupiah ($97 billion) worth of national strategic projects for the 2020-24 period, Chief Economic Affairs Minister Airlangga Hartarto said. The rail project, part of Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative being built by a consortium of Chinese and Indonesian state companies, is facing a one-year delay due to the coronavirus pandemic, Hartarto said. China unexpectedly won the Jakarta-Bandung contract in 2015 despite stiff competition from Japan and Indonesian authorities had previously discussed with Japanese authorities a separate Jakarta-Surabaya rail project.

Source: Bangkok Post May 29, 2020 10:46 UTC