OREANDA-NEWS. June 05, 2009. At the 4th international business forum Strategic Partnership 1520 (Sochi) the Bank for Development and Foreign Affairs (Vnesheconombank) state corporation, Russian Railways (RZhD) and JSC TransContainer signed a Memorandum of Cooperation on the projects aimed at the development of the international rail transit infrastructure between Europe and Asia.

The Memorandum was signed by Vnesheconombank’s Board of Directors Member Anatoly Ballo, RZhD’s Senior Vice President Boris Lapidus and JSC TransContainer’s CEO Peter Baskakov.

The parties to the Memorandum agreed on cooperation and coordination of the international rail transit infrastructure projects devised to offer end-to-end service solutions and to set up a single cargo handling infrastructure on the territory of Kazakhstan and the Russian Federation to expand the transit potential of the latter and encourage the export of Russian transit services.

The Memorandum continues the agreement on cooperation on terminal cargo handling signed earlier between RZhD and NK Kazakhstan Temir Zholy (KTZh) on May 21 in Astana, Kazakhstan.

The Memorandum should foster the expansion of the transit transport and logistic infrastructure in Russia and CIS, encourage the integration of transport networks of the neighboring states and enable the Russian and CIS freight transport operators to launch joint projects on the development of different transport business segments.