National Payment Card System (NSPK), operator of Russia’s Mir domestic payments network, has begun rolling out support for Android NFC mobile payments.

The new Mir Pay service uses tokenization and is supported on NFC phones running Android 6.0 Marshmallow and above.

Eight of the more than 160 banks that issue Mir cards have signed up to take part in the initial rollout — Russian Agricultural Bank, Russian National Commercial Bank, Center-invest Bank, SMP Bank, Bank Russia, UBRD, Credit Bank of Moscow and Promsvyazbank.

Overall, more than 55m contact and contactless Mir cards are in circulation today, NSPK says.

“The popularity of mobile payment services in our country is growing at a rapid pace,” says NSPK director general Vladimir Komlev.

“Over the past year the number of transactions performed with their help has more than tripled. We are sure that thanks to the launch of Mir Pay, Russian payment cardholders will also appreciate the speed and convenience of our own national payment service using a smartphone.”