The first shipment of U.S. non-military supplies intended for the coalition troops in Afghanistan have crossed Russia, said officials and media reports on Tuesday.
Russian officials and media reports said that a train carrying U.S. military supplies for the American troops fighting Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan has passed through Russia into Kazakhstan on Tuesday.
They said that the train had left the Latvian port of Riga last week and is currently in Kazakhstan after crossing the Russian territory.
The US embassy in Latvia had said last week that Washington was planning to route 20 to 30 shipments of supplies to Afghanistan each week through Latvia, Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.
Earlier, the U.S. had reached agreements with various Central Asian countries and Russia for opening new supply routes through their territories for the U.S. and NATO forces stationed in Afghanistan.
The agreements were reached after the recent Taliban attacks on convoys carrying supplies to the NATO and U.S. forces in Afghanistan via Pakistan's volatile North-West Frontier Province forced the alliance to look for other safer routes.
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