encourage other Japanese companies to utilize the Trans-Siberian over the sea route. In 2011, a direct container rail service began carrying car parts from Leipzig, Germany, to inland Shenyang, China, through Siberia in 23 days, every day. In 2013 a direct container, pallet, and general cargo rail service began, from Łódź, Poland, to inland Chengdu, China, through Siberia in 14 days, 3 days each week. According to Russian statistics, the amount of international container shipments transiting annually through Russia over the Trans-Siberian has grown by a factor of 7 between 2009 and 2014, reaching 131,000 TEU (55,000 physical containers) in 2014. Belarusian Railways reported similar statistics: in 2014, the volume of direct container traffic from China to Western Europe crossing Belarus amounted to 40,600 TEU, on 25 direct container train routes. This constituted over 20% of Belarusian Railway's entire volume of container transportation that year, 193,100 TEU. While significant, and growing, this is still much less than 0.1% of the number of containers that travel via China's sea ports (some 170 million TEU). China and the land bridge Direct connections between Russia and China The original Moscow–Vladivostok route, completed in 1904, cut across China's northeastern provinces, or Manchuria; the section of the railway located within China was known as the Chinese Eastern Railway. While the more northerly Trans-Siberian route, located entirely on Russian soil, was completed in 1916, the former Chinese Eastern Railway route continues as an important connector between the two countries' railway networks. The western border point (Zabaykalsk/Manzhouli) and the line connecting it to the Trans-Siberian main line, are now being upgraded, with the goal of enabling the railway by 2010 to pass 30 freight trains in each direction across the border, each one up to 71 cars long. The cross-border freight volume at this rail crossing is expected to reach 25.5 million tons by 2010. Besides cargo (principally, Russian oil exported to China), this crossing sees a direct weekly passenger train, Moscow–Beijing, as well as some local passenger trains. The eastern border point of the former Chinese Eastern Railway, at Suifenhe/Grodekovo, sees significant use as well, with over 8 million tons of freight crossing the border there in 2007, and regular cross-border passenger service. A third, little-known and less used, rail connection between Russia and China was built farther south, between Hunchun (in China's Jilin province) and Russian Makhalino (a station on the Ussuriysk–Khasan–North Korean border line,