Kulma Pass

The Kulma Pass or Qolma Pass, also referred to as Karasu Pass, is a mountain pass across the Pamir Mountains on the border between Murghob District, Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region in Tajikistan and Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County, Kashgar Prefecture, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in China. Asian Highway AH66 runs through the pass, which provides for the only modern day overland border crossing along the 450 km boundary between the two nations.The pass has an elevation of 4,362.7 metres and opens from the north to the southeast, and is 500 m wide from north to south and 1 km in length from east to west with a gentle incline not exceeding 20 degrees. On the Tajik side, the pass is 80 km by road to Murghab and about 850 km to Dushanbe. On the Chinese side, the pass is 13.9 km from Karasu, a port of entry on the Karakorum Highway which leads to Tashkurgan and Kashgar. The pass is open from the 16th to the 30th day of each month from May to November.