Officials from China and Serbia held a ceremony on Sunday to celebrate the start of construction of a section of the E763 Expressway in Serbia, being built by a Chinese state-owned company, one day after the Belgrade-Novi Sad section of the Belgrade-Budapest Railway became operational.
According to an article released by China’s Embassy in Serbia, the section between Požega and Duga Poljana, constructed by the China Road & Bridge Corporation (CRBC) under China Communications Construction, is the largest infrastructure project in the southern area of the country. It runs through the south-central part of Serbia, covering a total length of 75 kilometers, of which 51 kilometers consists of bridges and tunnels.
In the future, the section will be extended southward to connect a highway that links with Montenegro.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said that the construction of the section, consisting many bridges and tunnels, is extremely difficult to build. Thanks to Serbia’s “hard-core” friend China and Chinese companies, the expressway will become a reality, which will greatly boost local economic recovery and improve residents’ lives alongside the section, Vucic noted.
Entering the new year, China has accelerated infrastructure construction in Serbia.
On Saturday, Serbia signed a contract with the CRBC for the construction of a bridge over the Danube and linking-up road in Novi Sad, the second largest city in the country. The 4.44-kilometer project with designed speed of 80 kilometers per hour will effectively relieve local traffic pressure and promote local economic development.
On the same day, the Belgrade-Novi Sad section of the Belgrade-Budapest Railway, a flagship project under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), also went into operation.
President Vucic, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and other government officials took the train from the Belgrade railway station. About 33 minutes later, the train arrived at the station at Novi Sad to a warm greeting from local residents.
The railway, which is an important project under the BRI, shows the uninterrupted progress of the initiative despite difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and rising geopolitical tensions in Europe.
Photo taken on March 25, 2021 shows the construction site of the Belgrade-Budapest high-speed railway in Belgrade, Serbia.Photo:Xinhua
