OREANDA-NEWS. April 02, 2012. Russian Railways and Joint Stock Company Serbian Railways have signed a General Agreement to implement railway transport projects in the Republic of Serbia, reported the press-centre of Russian Railways.

The agreement was signed in Moscow by Vladimir Yakunin, President of Russian Railways, and Milovan Markovic, Director General of JSC Serbian Railways.

The two companies have agreed to implement the following projects to construct and reconstruct railway infrastructure in the Republic of Serbia:

construction of a new electrified single-track 68km railwa line between Valjevo – Loznica

construction and electrification of 16 km on the second track of the railway line between Belgrade – Pancevo

reconstruction of 200 km on the Serbian section of the Belgrade - Bar railway line

reconstruction of 6 stretches on the railway line of European Transport Corridor X with a total length of 111 km

supply and delivery of diesel trains

Financing the projects will be done in accordance with an Intergovernmental Agreement between the Russian Federation and the Republic of Serbia for a loan of USD 800 million. The Serbian side will contribute USD 120 million, making the total value of the contracts to implement the above projects USD 920 million.

As Milovan Markovic noted, however, the loan agreement must still be ratified.

"We have now formalised what we have long since agreed. I hope that after completing the ratification procedures for these agreements at government level, the document we have now signed will allow us to begin work immediately," said Vladimir Yakunin, President of Russian Railways, after the signing.

The volume of work on each project and the deadlines and other terms will be defined in individual contracts.

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Serbian Railways is operated by the state-owned company JSC Serbian Railways.

The Serbian rail network consists of 4,347 km of 1435 mm gauge track, of which about 1,390 km (32%) are electrified.

Most of the lines and structures were built between 1950 and 1970. No major renovations have been carried out during this period.

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The tenth Pan-European Transport Corridor (Corridor X) is part of the system of transport corridors approved by the decisions of the II Pan-European Conference on Crete in March 1994 and the III Pan-European Conference in Helsinki in June 1997.

Participants in Corridor X are the railways of Austria, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia and Bulgaria.

Corridor X’s railway sections total 2,528 km in length. In accordance with the track reconstruction plan for the railway lines in Corridor X, it is scheduled to restore Serbia’s railway infrastructure on six stretches with a total length of 111.36 km.

Trains are currently limited to speeds of up to 30 kph on these stretches. If the reconstruction on these stretches is not completed, however, speeds could be limited to 20 kph by 2013.

As a result of the reconstruction, through capacity on the line should increase and train speeds rise to 120 kph.