During a meeting between Baltic transport ministers in Brussels this morning, it was agreed to continue moving forward with the coordination of the Rail Baltica high-speed rail line project, as well as to involve Poland in the project.

As the Transport Ministry informed the business information portal Nozare.lv, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia have agreed to send a letter to Poland with an invitation to participate in the Rail Baltica task force, reports LETA.

As reported, during a joint press conference in Riga this past January Latvian Prime Minister Valdis Dombrovskis (Unity) and European Commission Deputy Chairman and Transport Commissioner Siim Kallas said that "for successful implementation of the high-speed railroad project Rail Baltica," it is of utmost importance that an 85% co-funding be secured from the European Union, and this is entirely feasible."

The officials emphasized that it is important to establish the projects that will be carried out within the framework of "Connecting Europe" program. It is planned that the program's projects will be evaluated during Denmark's EU presidency. The program will receive EUR 50 billion (LVL 35.14 billion) altogether.

LETA also reported, implementation of Rail Baltica would cost EUR 1.27 billion (LVL 889 million) to Latvia and EUR 3.68 billion (LVL 2.57 billion) to the Baltic States altogether, according to a study carried out by the British consulting company Aecom Ltd..