Europe will not help Ukraine restore locomotive production — senator

MOSCOW, October 6. /TASS/. People shouldn't expect Europe to help Kiev restore locomotive production amid Ukraine’s acute shortage of trains, as the country is of interest to the EU market primarily as a sales market and supplier of raw materials and agricultural products, DPR Senator Alexander Voloshin told TASS.

Earlier, Ukrainian Agriculture and Food Minister Taras Vysotsky said the country was experiencing an acute shortage of trains. According to the minister, Ukraine has almost no transport reserves left.

"The European market is certainly not obliged to save Ukrainian industry. Europe benefits more from having a sales market and supplier of raw materials and agricultural products nearby than a competitor with a fully developed machine-building sector. Therefore, expecting someone to come and restore the previous industrial model for Ukrainians after its final dismantling is rather naive," Voloshin said.

He noted that Ukraine inherited the necessary industrial base from the Soviet Union, including expertise in transport engineering, but failed to preserve and develop this potential. Moreover, Kiev consistently rejected economic cooperation with Russia, a country that produces equipment for the same railway gauge and had been a natural market for Ukrainian machine-building for decades.

"As a result, Ukraine found itself in a situation where it failed to protect its own industry while deeming its old import chains unnecessary. Now it has to face a very practical question: where to get equipment for its own railway system. And this is where it becomes clear that the industrial base cannot be replaced by either European subsidies or lofty statements about European integration," the senator concluded.

On the locomotive situation

In September, Ukrainian Restoration, Infrastructure and Transport Minister Nikolay Kalashnik said Ukraine had lost more than 600 locomotives since February 2022 and was in urgent need of assistance. According to him, Kiev hopes to develop a systemic mechanism for assistance from its partners that would include locomotives, financing, energy security measures and modernization. In late September, the Ukrainian Cabinet allowed Ukrzaliznytsia (Ukrainian Railways) to purchase used railway traction rolling stock without holding the required tenders.

The Russian Defense Ministry has repeatedly reported that Russian forces are striking locomotives and railway trains used in the interests of the Ukrainian armed forces.