MINSK, 4 Feb. The Belarusian and Russian sides agreed at the first stage to build and restore the operation of seven railway sidings in the direction of the ports of St. Petersburg in order to increase the capacity of the infrastructure, said the Belarusian Ambassador to the Russian Federation Dmitry Krutoy.
«Investment plans of the Belarusian and Russian railways have been agreed upon. The first stage is the construction of 7 sidings, that is, the restoration of sidings that were actually mothballed after the USSR. They need to be quickly restored. The basic task is to ensure the volume of transshipment by 2025 (in the amount — ed.) 15 million tons (per year) of our cargo using the ports of St. Petersburg,” the ambassador said in an interview with the Belarus 1 TV channel.
The diplomat explained that last year the ports of St. Petersburg became the base for transshipment of Belarusian export cargo due to the advantages of logistics, but with the existing railway infrastructure, the ceiling for cargo transshipment has actually been reached, which has increased several times compared to 2021 -2022 years. “Over the past year, this (transshipment volume – ed.) was 14.1 million tons of cargo through all Russian ports, of which 12.9 million tons were the ports of St. Petersburg,” he said.
Krutoy also noted that Belarus is faced with the task of using the advantages of the ports of Murmansk and the Northern Sea Route to deliver Belarusian cargo to China. He emphasized that this logistics route is now being actively developed by the Russian and Chinese sides, and it is important for Belarus not to miss the moment and “to integrate into this process.”
«We have such plans. I think that in the first half of the year (2024 — ed.) we will finally decide on the Murmansk options,» the diplomat said.