Backgrounder: China's major railway construction projects in Africa, Latin America

Angola

In 2015, a 1,344-km railroad project spanning the African country of Angola was complete and was put into operation.

The line, built by the China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC), boasts the fastest traveling speed in the country and will serve as a significant economic corridor there.

The railway linking the coastal city of Lobito in the west and Luau bordering Angola is the second longest railway built by a Chinese company for Africa, after the Tanzania-Zambia railway.

The railway, built since 2004, will be linked with the Angola-Zambian railway and the Tanzania-Zambia railway in the future.

Transcontinental South American railway

In July 2014, China, Brazil and Peru agreed to build a railway that runs across the South American continent, which is aimed at linking the Brazilian Atlantic coast with the Peruvian Pacific coast.

The agreement came after a meeting of Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Brazilian and Peruvian counterparts, Dilma Rousseff and Ollanta Humala.

The three leaders exchanged views on boosting the construction of transport infrastructure in South America and promoting inter-connectivity between South American and Asian markets.

In his separate talks with Rousseff and Humala, Xi stressed Beijing's readiness to expand win-win cooperation in infrastructure construction with Latin American countries, and called for concerted efforts in building the transcontinental South American railway into a success.