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Kaliningrad governor says ceiling of railway transit of goods through Lithuania reached

It is reported that the transit of sanctioned goods from the main territory of the Russian Federation to Kaliningrad and back through the European Union is limited

KALININGRAD, August 9. /TASS/. The Kaliningrad Region has reached the ceiling of railway transit of certain goods through Lithuania, Governor Anton Alikhanov said on Tuesday.

"As of today, we have already reached the ceiling set by the Europeans on railway transit of certain cargoes, for example, certain types of iron, steel, oil and petroleum products, fertilizers, antifreezer, timber," he said at the Valdai International Discussion Club.

The transit of sanctioned goods from the main territory of the Russian Federation to Kaliningrad and back through the European Union is limited, the governor explained. The EU considers whether the flow of traffic is in line with the average volume of goods carried to the region by railway in 2019, 2020 and 2021, calculating the average volumes on each type of goods separately for calendar year, he said. "Those calculations do not take into account cargoes carried by road before sanctions restrictions were imposed. According to recent data provided by our customs bodies, around 400,000 tonnes of cargoes that were sanctioned, were supplied to the region from Russia’s main territory by road in 2021. From our territory roughly 100,000 tonnes of cargoes were delivered, meaning half a million tonnes of cargo. <…> We cannot carry it even by rail, though the Europeans see this transit in their statistics. However, for some reason they do not allow carrying those goods by rail, though they have permitted railway transit," Alikhanov noted.

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