Since the World Health Organization's (WHO) declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic, borders around the world have been deeply impacted, and Customs administrations, transport authorities and the railway sector are doing their part to prevent and fight the spread of COVID-19, while trying to safeguard supply chain continuity.

Expecting any probable outbreak of COVID-19 in the Islamic Republic of Iran, caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus, Iranian Railway has been one of the pioneer organisations inside the country that established a special committee, days before the arrival and outbreak of COVID-19 in the country, in order to plan and take any necessary actions to be more prepared to confront this situation.

Dear passengers!

 At the moment, the spread of coronavirus infection has become the most problematic and knife-edged topic of the day. We understand that when setting off for a trip, you needn’t worry about your health. Therefore, it is worth telling you what measures are taken to make your trip safer.

Being a public transport, the railway plays an important role in the everyday life of the people. That is why the issues of preserving the health of passengers and railway workers, especially in the conditions of a virus epidemic outbreak, play a paramount role, since the mass movement of people from one region to another can affect the situation with the spread of the virus.

Occupying a strategic position at the crossroads of transit flows and possessing a developed transport and logistics facilities, the Republic of Azerbaijan keeps a sensible and liable approach towards fulfilling the tasks that arise from the need to ensure freight traffic between East and West, North and South. And despite the situation that has arisen as a result of the negative influence of restrictive measures taken to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, the freight traffic continues to be provided without delay to ensure sustainable trade and economic ties between the countries.

The Federal State Budgetary Establishment of Continuing Professional Education “Training and Methodological Center for Education in Railway Transport” (‘UMC ZDT’) has been preparing to start publishing the quarterly scientific and practical journal “Transport Technician: Education and Practice” designed to be used in training personnel for the transport Industry. Its first issue is due to be released in June 2020.

The first train from Wuhan (Hubei Province, China) since the outbreak of the Covid-19 epidemic marked the restoration of Wuhan-Duisburg regular container service on the China-Europe route.

Regardless of the negative impact of COVID-19 on economic processes in global markets, LDz continues to provide regular freight transportation, including by long trains from Asia to Europe. Operation of such extra-long trains in the territory of Latvia has become possible thanks to a cooperation project with the Russian Railways OJSC, launched in recent months, as well as the high quality of LDz infrastructure.

In order to update the fleet of long-distance coaches of the Federal Passenger Company JSC (FPC, a subsidiary of the Russian Railways OJSC and an OSJD observer), 187 new coaches were delivered onto the Russian Railways network in the first quarter of 2020, which would replace the outdated rolling stock. Of these, 150 coaches represent single-decker two-coach strings (compartment and open-plan) and 37 coaches are double-decker compartment wagons (including coaches with seats for the disabled persons and dining cars).

On 1 April 2020 a train originating from Shenyang in the east of China arrived in Enns (Austria) for the first time. It is the next phase in the successful cooperation between the Far East Land Bridge Ltd. (FELB( and Sinotrans Ltd., which has already led to many connections on the New Silk Road.