A consortium led by South Korea's Hyundai Engineering and Construction Co has made the lowest bid of 2.6 billion dollars for a long-delayed Kuwaiti causeway project, the tenders committee said Monday.

The causeway, to be named after late emir Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah, is to link the capital Kuwait City with the northern Subbiya area which is to become home to a Silk City project.

The oil-rich state's central tenders committee said the Hyundai bid was followed by an offer from a consortium led by Bin Laden Group of Saudi Arabia that bid 2.85 billion dollars for the 25-kilometre (16-mile) causeway.

The committee said the project contractor, the public works ministry, will evaluate the bids before making a final selection.

The 77-billion-dollar Silk City aims to revive the ancient Silk Road trade route by becoming a major free trade zone linking central Asia with Europe.

The city, on the northern tip of Kuwait on the Iraqi border, will include what could be the tallest tower in the world. When complete in 2030, it will be home to around 700,000 people and is projected to create 450,000 jobs.

Subbiya is also a few kilometers (miles) away from a huge multi-billion-dollar container harbour being built on Bubyan Island.

Earlier this year, the Gulf state parliament approved a four-year development plan which envisages spending more than 100 billion dollars on a large number of mega-projects. >