Uzbekistan has decided to revive a railway project that would link several southern districts and bypass Turkmenistan, a neighbor with whom relations have significantly worsened, railway officials said Wednesday. An Uzbek government decree issued last week ordered the construction of the Tashguzar-Boysun-Kumkurgan line be speeded up and finished in 2007. The line will link the three district centers with the country\'s main railway line connecting the capital Tashkent with other parts of the country. The new line will allow trains heading from Tashkent for destinations in the southeast and on to Tajikistan to bypass Turkmenistan. The decision comes a month after Turkmenistan expelled the Uzbek ambassador there over accusations he aided the organizers of a Nov. 25 assassination attempt on the Turkmen president. There has also been friction between Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan for several years over transport and water sharing. Railway lines in Central Asia were laid before the region was cut into five Soviet republics in the 1920s, and traveling by train between different regions of the same country sometimes involves crossing through another country. The Uzbek government said the new line would boost the economy of the two southernmost regions, Kashkadarya and Surkhandarya, as it will facilitate the development of oil, gas and ore deposits there. The project to build the 220-kilometer (135-mile) line was launched in 1995 but has been practically halted in the past few years for lack of funding. (AP)