KYIV (Reuters) – Ukraine aims to bypass a border blockade by Polish truck drivers by bringing in lorries on train platforms, Interfax Ukraine news agency quoted an official from the national railways company as saying on Thursday.
Protests by Polish truckers started last month against the terms of EU access for Ukrainian lorries. They blocked the main land corridors into Ukraine, leading to higher prices for fuel and some food items as well as delays to drone deliveries to the Ukrainian army.
“Now we have a loaded train standing at the crossing with Hrubeshuv (on the Ukrainian-Polish border). We already have 23 loaded container wagons with lorries,” Valeriy Tkachov, deputy director of the commercial department at the railway, was quoted as saying.
He said that the Ukrainian and Polish sides were currently harmonising technical issues.
“As soon as this test train passes and all is well, we will launch this on a mass scale,” Tkachov said.
Ukrainian authorities say about 3,000 lorries are blocked on the Polish side of the Polish-Ukrainian border and so far the authorities have not been able to agree with the protesters on terms to stop the action.
Polish hauliers’ main demand is to stop Ukrainian truckers having permit-free access to the European Union, something that Kyiv and Brussels say is impossible.
(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk and Julia Dysa; Editing by Toby Chopra)
