Business news

MINSK, 13 May (BelTA) – A regular session of the Railway Transport Council of the Commonwealth of Independent States will take place in Minsk on 20-21 May, BelTA learned from the press service of Belarusian Railways, the organizer of the event.

The session’s agenda includes 12 items concerning the coordination of actions of the CIS railway administrations with regard to international transportation of passengers and cargoes, the joint use of the available freight cars and containers, mutual payments for transportation and services rendered, the development of common regulatory documents.

Apart from that, participants of the session will have to make decisions to update regulatory documents on the international transportation of passengers and cargoes, maintenance and repair of the rolling stock. Bilateral meetings between heads of the railway administrations will be part of the event.

Organizing and taking part in the CIS Railway Transport Council’s session is the most important event for Belarusian Railways this year in international cooperation development, said the source.

Taking part in the session will be Chairman of the Directorate of the CIS Railway Transport Council Piotr Kucherenko, heads of the railway administrations of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Ukraine. Representatives of Bulgaria, Georgia, Latvia, Finland, Lithuania, Estonia, and Iran will also arrive. The session will be chaired by Vladimir Yakunin, President of OAO Russian Railways.

The Railway Transport Council of the Commonwealth of Independent States and its executive body (the Directorate) were established in 1992. The Council primarily focuses on ensuring the technological unity of the railways. Every year traffic schedules and plans for compiling international trains are developed. A lot of attention is also paid to the technical state of freight cars. The previous session took place in Baku, Azerbaijan in October 2014.