The contract continues. That is what the Belgian responsible for one of the country’s greatest tenders have said. The so -called “Century Contract” will therefore fall on CAF, the great Spanish rail giant. The Spanish company will be in charge of providing trains to the “Belgian Renfe”.
Refused. The State Council of Belgium has spoken. And what has decided is that it rejects the last resort that Alstom had presented in the award contest to provide the CNS (the Belgian Renfe) of a huge battery of trains to modernize much of the fleet.
In The mail They detail that the Belgian State Council had already rejected a resource for Siemens last week and now has been dismissed that of Alstom. The process has been especially long and complex with numerous resources presented, comings and goings and reconfirmations.
“The contract of the century”. Given the enormous volume of money that will move this contract, it does not seem that the famous denomination of “the contract of the century” is left great. To start, the investment will be 1,695 million euros but if the deadlines and volume of deliveries are met, CAF could receive up to 3.4 billion euros.
The amount will be paid for The supply of 500 trains Automotores including three car models with battery hybrid propulsion that will have the task of replacing the old diesel locomotives in those roads that have not yet been electrified. With the rejection of the latest resources, it only remains to negotiate the last details and sign the greatest contract in the history of CAF.
Long and complex. Getting with this contract has not been simple for the Spanish company. At the beginning of the year, Alstom and Siemens resorted to the award of CAF to CAF, claiming that the motivations for it were not transparent enough. In April, a Belgian court recommended suspending the contest.
During that time, Alstom took the opportunity to press by pointing out that his proposal was better because they have a plant on Belgian soil, emphasizing that the decision to take out this contract would harm the citizens themselves because they were not betting on local employment as a decisive factor.
The process, however, continued. However, CAF has had to wait for the Belgian authorities to definitely reject the resource of Siemens and a second resource by emergency presented by Alstom, who insisted again on a supposed lack of transparency.
Israel. During the last bars of all this bureaucratic framework, various voices rose to question the award of CAF. They defended that a company that was associated with the Israeli Shapir could not be hired to build and expand the red and green lines of the Light Jerusalem Rail.
The project is problematic because it will be built on illegal Israeli settlements. That has caused the Basque company to have been indicated in an official UN report as one of the companies that take revenues from the country’s antipalestine policy. They specify that with this type of works these illegal settlements are helped.
500 million euros. That is what is estimated to take coffee If the Israeli project goes ahead. This is valued at 1.8 billion euros to lift 27 kilometers of roads and 50 new stations. With them we want to connect the West Bank settlements with those of West Jerusalem.
The business for CAF does not remain alone in the construction of this light meter. It is also about to decide when it will participate in the management of the lines. At the moment, it is being assessed that its involvement is maintained between 15 and 25 years once between operation. CAF shields that the award of the contract is prior to the Israeli invasion of Palestine.
Do not get into. At least that is what they say from SCNB. Appealed by up to four associations that rejected that CAF received this contest for its involvement with the project in the West Bank and Jerusalem, the Belgian operator has responded that it cannot “determine the foreign or commercial policy of the companies involved,” they collect in The mail.
Its position is contrary to other companies in the sector. The Norwegian sovereign fund, for example, has retired its investments in Shapir (the partner of CAF in the Israeli project) for the genocide committed in Gaza and the Manager Storeband also took CA from its portfolio for its involvement. The Catalan company Comsa was also part of the consortium that had gained the award of the blue line of the tram to Jerusalem but In 2024 he retired from the project and The Basque Siner announced that it will not serve steel to Israeli companies.
Photo | CAF and ABODI VESAKARAN
In Xataka | Renfe wanted to renew his fleet in Cantabria and Asturias. Until he was wrong with the width of his trains
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