Parts reaches railway cooperation agreement with his Russian counterpart

TALLINN – Estonian Economy Minister Juhan Parts on Wednesday had a meeting in Moscow with Russian Transport Minister Maksim Sokolov and president Putin's transport adviser Igor Levitin, Public Broadcasting reports.

Parts raised at the meeting the issue of unification of railway tariffs due to WTO membership. The Russian officials said that the railway tariffs would be unified according to the obligations taken by Russia in the middle of the next year and confirmed that there are no administrative restrictions on the railway capacity in the Estonian direction by Russia.

Both ministers considered it necessary to develop the Tallinn-St. Petersburg railway connection, both regarding the infrastructure and services.

Russian officials agreed to Parts’ proposal to conclude an inter-governmental railway transport cooperation agreement and as a part of that, a plan on railway direct connection border agreement. A working group to improve the Tallinn-St. Petersburg railway transport corridor will be formed.

The officials considered it necessary to restart the work of the bilateral transport committee. The Estonian side expressed a wish to renew the aviation agreement. Parts also asked Russia for more transport permits to service the growing demand in the tourism sector.