Russia to build railway line bypassing Ukraine

MOSCOW - Russia will build new railway tracks that bypass Ukrainian territory, Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said Thursday.

"There are four (Russia-Ukraine) border crossing points. Project to avoid these points will be implemented promptly," Sokolov was quoted by RIA Novosti news agency as saying.

Financing of the construction of the 60-km line has been covered by the federal budget for 2015-2018, with 25.5 billion rubles ($521 million) allocated for the project, Sokolov said.

Currently, several short stretches of rail lines linking Moscow to southern Russia cut through Ukrainian territory for several times in Russia's Voronezh and Rostov regions.

In the town of Chertkovo in Rostov region, eastern part of the railway station lays in Russia and the western part in Ukraine, serving both Russian and Ukrainian localities.

Moreover, one of these stretches, 26-km-long, goes through eastern Ukraine's Lugansk region where armed conflict has been fought between Ukrainian government troops and pro-independence insurgents.