On 3 December 2021, two trains departed from China and Laos to meet each other, therefore marking the official commissioning of the China-Laos railway line that runs in the terrain being rich of mountains, rivers and other natural obstacles. The opening of the railway line was timed to coincide with the 46^th anniversary of the foundation of The Lao People’s Democratic Republic.

The Estonian state-owned freight operator Operail signed an agreement of intent with Stargate Hydrogen in October 2021 to convert 40 diesel locomotives into hydrogen-fueled locomotives. These locomotives will be used for shunting operations.

A ceremony was held in Vientiane for the handover of the first high-speed passenger electric train to the Laos-China Railway joint venture, to be operated on the new railway section linking China and Laos. Laying of track on this railway was recently completed.

The System integrator Belam (Lithuania) in conjunction with the Cepton based in Silicon Valley (USA) implemented an intelligent signaling system at one of the busy railway level crossings in Lithuania.

The Railway Transport Engineering Center JSC (a joint venture of the Russian Railways Holding and the Sinara - Transport Machines JSC) and the Siemens Mobility signed a cooperation agreement on a project for the development and production of a high-speed electric train to be operated on high-speed railway lines in the Russian Federation.

The meeting was organised by the OSJD Committee, Warsaw, as an online videoconference and held on 28-30 September 2021 as required by the Work Plan of the OSJD Commission on Passenger Traffic for 2021.

The IX Forum of Intermodal Transport (FRACHT) was held in Warsaw (Poland) from 18 till 19 August 2021 in an intramural format.

The final meeting of the representatives of the Parties to the Agreement on the “Rules for Accounting International Passenger and Freight Railway Traffic” was held in accordance with the Work Plan of the OSJD Permanent Working Group on Finance and Accounting (PWGF) for 2021 in the format of a video conference.

On 15 October 2021, a working meeting was held between the delegation of the OSJD Committee headed by the Chairman of the OSJD Committee Mirosław Antonowicz and the delegation of the Embassy of the Republic of Korea in the Republic of Poland, headed by HE Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Mira Sun.

Under the Work Plan of the OSJD Commission on Transport Policy and Development Strategy for 2021, the 9^th International Interagency Meeting of OSJD Member Countries on the Practices of Border Crossing by Railway Transport was organised and conducted by the OSJD Committee in a hybrid format on 21-22 September 2021. The event addressed the topical area “Development of measures aimed to facilitate border crossing in international railway transport operations in Eurasia”, and its face-to-face part took place in Gdańsk, Poland.