CER General Assembly: Crister Fritzson appointed CER Acting Chairman
Chaired by CER Vice-Chairman Guillaume Pepy (President of SNCF), the CER Management Committee appointed Crister Fritzson (Chairman of the Swedish Association of Train Operators, ASTOC, and CEO & President of SJ) as CER Acting Chairman with immediate effect. This position became vacant on 30 January following the resignation of former CER Chairman Rüdiger Grube as CEO of Deutsche Bahn.
The General Assembly subsequently endorsed Mr Fritzson’s mandate until September 2017. On 25 September, the CER General Assembly will elect the Management Committee (including Chairman and Vice-Chairs) for the term 2018-2019.
Additional changes included the election of ÖBB CEO Andreas Matthä as member of the CER Management Committee. The association also welcomed two new partners: Israel Railways and Rail Baltica Rail AS.
Four CER member companies – Deutsche Bahn (Germany), HZ Infrastruktura (Croatia), Trainose (Greece), and ŽS Infrastructure (Serbia) – signed the “European Solidarity Charter” in the presence of European Commission DG MOVE Director-General Henrik Hololei. The “European Charter for the development of social and societal initiatives in train stations” is an initiative of the European railway sector based on rail companies’ commitment to the objective of fighting social exclusion enshrined in the EU Treaties. Current signatories are: ČD (Czech Republic), CFL (Luxembourg), CFR SA (Romania), DSB (Denmark), FSI (Italy), Jernhusen (Sweden), NRIC (Bulgaria), NSB (Norway), PKP (Poland), SNCB (Belgium), SNCF (France) and SŽ (Slovenia).