Iran resumes rail services on routes damaged by war

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TEHRAN – Iran has resumed rail services on key routes after repairing sections of track damaged during the war with Israel and the US, state media said on April 13.

The authorities have in recent days begun reconstruction work on bridges, railway lines and other infrastructure hit during nearly 40 days of fighting.

A fragile ceasefire has been in place since April 8.

In Iran’s north-western Azerbaijan region, the director-general of the railways said trains had resumed from the city of Tabriz, bound for the capital Tehran and Mashhad in the north-east.

“These trains have resumed service after an interruption of four to five days,” said Mr Alireza Soleimani, according to Iran’s official IRNA news agency.

“The Tehran-Tabriz-Van train also left Tehran for Van, Turkey, last night, using rebuilt tracks.”

A railway bridge near the city of Qom, south of Tehran, also reopened on April 11 after reconstruction work which lasted “less than 40 hours”, said deputy governor in Qom province Khosrow Samari, according to the Tasnim news agency.

On April 10, Tasnim published video showing a train crossing the Yahya Abad bridge in the city of Kashan, in Iran’s central Isfahan province.

“After rapid reconstruction, the first train passed over the Yahya Abad Bridge today,” the news agency said, claiming the bridge had been targeted in a US-Israeli attack on April 7.

In the capital Tehran, residents have reported that the authorities have moved quickly to clear debris from sites hit.

Where buildings have been too heavily damaged, they have sometimes been covered or cordoned off, including with Iranian flags.

Government spokeswoman Fatemeh Mohajerani said on April 12 that reconstruction of damaged buildings would take between three months and two years.

She added that more than 125,000 buildings had been damaged since the war began, the majority of them residential but also schools, hospitals and other civilian facilities. AFP