At the end of March, an opening ceremony was held to mark the beginning of the construction and electrification of the second railway line from Pančevo Bridge in Belgrade to Pančevo Main Station.

The ceremony was attended by President of Russian Railways Vladimir Yakunin, Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov, President of the Republic of Serbia Tomislav Nikolić, Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia Ivica Dačić, CEO of Serbian Railways Dragoljub Simonović, CEO of RZD International (subsidiary of Russian Railways) Sergei Pavlov and other officials.

On 11 January 2013 at the Russian Finance Ministry, Anton Siluanov, Finance Minister of the Russian Federation, and Mlađan Dinkić, Minister of Finance and Economy of the Republic of Serbia, signed an agreement between the Government of the Russian Federation and the Government of the Republic of Serbia to provide the Republic of Serbia with a state export credit in the amount of USD 800 million. The total cost of the infrastructure projects is around USD 940 million. Serbia will thus finance about 15% of all the work.

Under this agreement, as well as the general agreement signed between Russian Railways and Serbian Railways on 27 March 2012, projects have been launched to construct or reconstruct the railway infrastructure on the territory of the Republic of Serbia.

The contract provides for the construction and electrification of 16 km of a second track on the Belgrade – Pančevo line, the reconstruction of six sections with a total length of 112 km for Pan-European Corridor X, the reconstruction of the existing track and the construction of a new second track on the Stara Pazova – Novi Sad railway (44 km), and the reconstruction of the Serbian section of the Belgrade – Bar railway with a total length of 200 km (Belgrade– Vrbnica).

(Source: RZD)