In the first half of this year, China put investment worth 62.19 billion yuan (US$7.77 billion) into railway construction, soaring 1.9 times year on year, the Ministry of Railways told Xinhua on Tuesday.

The Ministry said 61.364 billion yuan were invested for large and medium-sized railway construction projects, jumping 200 percent year on year.

According to the whole-year plan released by the Ministry of Railways at the beginning of 2006, the total investment for China's railway construction projects will reach 160 billion yuan this year.

China opened the first railway linking Tibet with the rest of the country this month. Built on the "Roof of the World " and zigzagging across 5,000-meter-high mountain ranges and a 550-km-long frozen belt, the Qinghai-Tibet railway is the first railway in Tibet, aiming at building a closer tie between the plateau with other parts of China.

Besides the Qinghai-Tibet railway, construction of other major railways has also been accelerated this year, including the Beijing-Tianjin inter-city track project and the electrified renovation of the Beijing-Shanghai railway.

(Xinhua News Agency July 12, 2006)