Russia limits railway connection with China, to decide on flights Fri

MOSCOW, Jan 30 (PRIME) -- The Russian government has suspended railway connection with China except the Moscow–Beijing and Beijing–Moscow routes and will decide whether to suspend air traffic no later than Friday, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said late on Wednesday.

“Under a decision of the emergency team, we restrict railway traffic from midnight on Friday, January 31. Trains will take only the Moscow–Beijing–Moscow route,” Golikova said after meeting with the emergency team organized to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

“We have agreed that the Transport and the Foreign Ministries will assess the number of our people who are to return to Russia and after that will decide on the flights to China and from China in two days, so we think that the next meeting of the emergency ream can take place no later than on Friday, and we will make a decision on air traffic,” Golikova said.

Russian Railways Deputy CEO Alexei Shilo said that the company sees notice lower cargo transit from China across Russia amid the coronavirus outbreak. “It’s hard to tell (the level of decline). We have little cargo from Wuhan, the cargo comes from the other provinces and traffic from these provinces has not stopped yet,” he said.

“We think there will be a decrease of traffic from China in February of course, this is because suspension of the plants was extended for several days.”

An outbreak of coronavirus started at the end of December in China’s city of Wuhan has affected 5,974 people, 132 of them died.

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