Russian Railways keen to attract Japanese investments to Moscow, Far East

TOKYO, February 29. /TASS/. Russian Railways is seeking to attract Japanese investments in transport infrastructure of the Far East and the Moscow region, President of the state-owned railroad monopoly Oleg Belozerov said Monday. "Creation of a common transport space requires and offers opportunities to invest both in a state and private sector. We’re interested in attracting investments from Japan for developing transport infrastructure, particularly in the Far East," he said. According to Belozerov, the company suggests "that investments are made in the projects aimed at development of terminal and logistics infrastructure in places where flows of cargoes are formed and focused in international transport corridors," including "investments in Moscow’s terminal and logistics centers." Also, President, said, a proposed connection to link the Russian island of Sakhalin with the Japanese island of Hokkaido is a promising project for bilateral cooperation. "An overland link between Sakhalin and Hokkaido will reduce the time of deliveries from Europe to Japan by more than half compared with traditional shipping route," he said. In 2015, shipments of tradable goods between the two countries rose by 1% to over 41 mln tonnes. "We’re interested in raising the share of Russian Railway’s infrastructure in shipment of Japanese companies’ goods. At the instruction of President and the government the company has been upgrading infrastructure of Siberia and the Far East, modernization of BAM and Transsib being discussed in the first place," Belozerov said. Read more