TRANS-SIB SHORT-CUT ROUTE FROM ASIA TO EUROPE MUCH CHEAPER THEN CIRCUITOUS ONE

VLADIVOSTOK, January 16, 2004. (RIA Novosti correspondent Anatoly Ilyukhov) - On Friday the first high-speed container train will set off from Nakhodka-Vostochnaya (a seaport 70 km eastward from the Maritime Territory's administrative centre) for the Moscow region's Bekasovo. It will take 9 days to reach the destination from the Pacific coast.

The schedule of cargo traffic provides 7 transit container train routes from Nakhodka-Vostochnaya, including 4 branches toward Finland, one to Brest and one to Moscow, the press service of the Far Eastern Railway reported.

Transit traffic down the Trans-Siberian Railway becoming popular with Asian businessmen, the modernisation of the Nakhodka-Vostochnaya station to improve its traffic capacity and to introduce computer technologies is underway.

994 high-speed container trains started out for European and Central Asian countries from the Maritime Territory in 2003, which is 50% more than in 2002.

The Trans-Siberian Railway is three times shorter than the Southern Pacific Sea Route across the Pacific and Indian Oceans and on through the Suez Canal.