France's Alstom delivers 37 freight rail cars to Azerbaijan

By Azernews

By Ayya Lmahamad

France's Alstom company has delivered 37 freight locomotives to Azerbaijan, Trend has reported.

Azerbaijan Railways press service head Natavan Bayramova stated that the 38th freight locomotive is currently being transported to Baku. She added that the last two (39th and 40th) have successfully passed all the necessary tests and are scheduled to be sent to Baku in the coming days.

Bayramova noted that Kazakhstan shows great interest in expanding freight traffic along the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, the Trans-Caspian International transport route, as well as the East-West corridor.

"In addition, our goods turnover, as well as cargo transportation is only growing every year and we see the need to expand cooperation within international transport corridors," she said.

Moreover, Alstom's managing director in Western and Central Asia Kanat Alpysbayev stated that Alstom is working with Azerbaijan Railways on railway signaling projects.

He noted that these locomotives play a key role in increasing the capacity of freight transportation in Azerbaijan, and also contribute to the grand goals of increasing the transit potential of the Trans-Caspian railway corridor.

"Despite all the difficulties that have arisen due to the pandemic, we, together with Azerbaijan Railways, have been able to achieve the completion of this important project. We are working on the further development of our close partnership with Azerbaijan Railways, including organization of service of the locomotive fleet and implementation of railway signaling projects," he said.

To recall, in 2014, Azerbaijan Railways signed a contract with Alstom for the supply of 50 electric locomotives worth euro 288 million, including 40 Prima T8 AZ8A heavy locomotives, which are manufactured at Alstom's joint venture EKZ in Kazakhstan and 10 Prima M4 AZ4A passenger locomotives, which are manufactured in France and have already been delivered to Azerbaijan.