Azerbaijan, Lithuania have great transport opportunities
By Trend
The Trans-Caspian international transport route and Viking projects open great opportunities for Azerbaijan and Lithuania in the field of transport, Valdas Lastauskas, Lithuanian ambassador to Azerbaijan, told Trend.
“It will be possible to transport goods from China to Northern and Western Europe as a result of connecting these two routes,” he said.
"The East-West transport corridor is actively growing,” he said. “It is one of the priority projects for Azerbaijan and corresponds to Viking project, which is being implemented by Lithuania and its partners, namely, Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey.”
“Our project has already reached Turkey and even Georgia,” he said. “A very positive fact is that Azerbaijan joined the project in May 2016. Azerbaijan's participation will make Viking project more competitive.”
The Trans-Caspian international transportation route runs from
China to Europe through Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey and
Ukraine.
The first test container train from China arrived at the Baku
International Sea Trade Port on August 3, 2015.
New competitive tariffs on the Trans-Caspian corridor came into
force on June 1, 2016.
The combined transport train ‘Viking’ started to run on Ilyichevsk (Ukraine) - Minsk (Belarus) - Draugyste (Lithuania) route with the total length of 1,766 kilometers in 2003. The project participants are Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania and Latvia. Later, Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey joined the project.
Ukraine and Lithuania signed a memorandum in February 2016 on
accession of the container train 'Viking' to the Trans-Caspian
International Transport Route from Europe to China through
Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.
Azerbaijan signed a protocol in May 2016 on participation of
Azerbaijan Railways CJSC in the 'Viking' international container
train.
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