Chinese Eastern Railway Zone

The Chinese Eastern Railway or CER (Chinese: trad. 東清鐵路, simp. 东清铁路, Dōngqīng Tiělù; Russian: Китайско-Восточная железная дорога or КВЖД, Kitaysko-Vostochnaya Zheleznaya Doroga or KVZhD), also known as the Chinese Far East Railway and Manchurian Railway, is the historical name for a railway across Manchuria (northeastern China).

The line was built by Imperial Russia using a concession from Qing China, and linked Chita with Vladivostok in the Russian Far East. The T-shaped line consisted of three branches: the western branch, now the Harbin–Manzhouli Railway, the eastern branch, now the Harbin–Suifenhe Railway, and the southern branch, now part of the Beijing–Harbin Railway, which intersected in Harbin. The railway and the concession, known as the Chinese Eastern Railway Zone, were administered from the city, which grew into a major rail hub.

The southern branch of the CER, known in the West as the South Manchuria Railway, became the locus and partial casus belli for the Russo-Japanese War, the 1929 Sino-Soviet Conflict, and the Second Sino-Japanese War. The Soviet Union handed the CER to the People's Republic of China in 1952.

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