AFRICA: Passenger train services from the Tunisian capital to Annaba in Algeria have restarted almost 30 years after being suspended.
The first train left Tunis on August 11. Tunisia’s SNCFT will initially operate services from Tunis on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, returning from Annaba on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. The 357 km journey takes 7 h, calling at Beja, Jendouba and Ghardimaou in Tunisia and Souk-Ahras in Algeria.
Each train has two first class and two second class coaches, giving a capacity of 300 passengers.
Services may be increased in the future if there is sufficient demand.
Speaking at the launch, Tunisian Minister of Infrastructure & Housing Sarra Zaâfrani Zanzri said the train service would ’strengthen cultural and economic ties, consolidating bilateral relations in various sectors and paving the way for strategic partnerships’.
Algerian Minister of Transport Mohamed El Habib Zahana said ’the reopening of this railway line will have a significant impact on economic and family relations between the populations of the Tunisian-Algerian border regions’.
Train services between the two countries were suspended in the 1995 because of the security situation in Algeria, with a short-lived revival in 2003.
