DUSHANBE, April 21, 2011, Asia-Plus -- Over the first three months of this year, Tajik Railways has shipped more than 2.4 million tons of cargo, which is 115,000 tons more than in the same period last year, the Tajik Railways deputy head Usmon Qalandarov announce at a news conference in Dushanbe on April 21.

“In the meantime, transit shipments have fallen 21 percent over the report period,” said Qalandarov, “1.1 million tons of transit cargo have been shipped via Tajik territory in January-March this year, which is 261,000 tons fewer than in the same period of 2010.”

According to him, decline in transit shipment has resulted from decrease in shipment of Uzbek commercial cargo via the territory of Tajikistan.

“This year, Uzbekistan plans to reduce cargo shipments via our territory by 2 million tons against last year,” Qalandarov noted.

“In January-March this year, Tajik Railways has carried more than 125,000 passengers, which is 20,500 passengers fewer than in the same period last year,” the official with Tajik state rail company said.

At present Tajik Railways offers three routes to the Russian Federation (Dushanbe-Moscow, Kulob-Moscow, and Khujand-Saratov) and four domestic routes (Dushanbe-Konibodom, Qurghon Teppa-Konibodom, Dushanbe-Pakhtaobod and Qurghon Teppa-Kulob).  It is to be noted that the Dushanbe-Konibodom route is temporarily suspended due to low passenger traffic.

Tajikistan’s rolling-stock now includes 1,929 cargo cars, 424 passenger carriages and 55 diesel locomotives.

The total length of rails in Tajikistan is 950 kilometers; of that, 680 kilometers are the main railways.  At present there are 33 railway stations in the republic.