Republika e Kosovës Republika Kosovo - Republic of Kosovo Kuvendi - Skupština - Assembly _______________________________________________________________________ Law No. 04/L-063 ON KOSOVO RAILWAYS Assembly of Republic of Kosovo, Based on Article 65 (1) of the Constitution of the Republic of Kosovo; Approves: LAW FOR KOSOVO RAILWAYS CHAPTER I GENERAL PROVISIONS Article 1 The aim of the Law The purpose of this law is the arrangement and development of railways, improvement of rail security system, open access and nondiscriminatory operators and offering services in the railway sector market. Article 2 Scope of the Law 1. This Law regulates: 1.1. the functions and competences of the State and of the railway bodies in charge of the development of the railway sector; 1.2 .the follow-up of railway sector restructuring; 1 1. 3. the operations and use of the railway infrastructure 1.4. the use of the railway network and infrastructure 1.5. the safety of the railway system; 1.6. the safety requirements for the railway system; 1.7. the interoperability of the railway system in Kosovo; 1.8. the modernization and the construction of the railway infrastructure; 1.9. the provision of rail transport services; 1.10. services in the public interest offered by the rail system. Article 3 Definitions 1. The terms used in this Law shall have the following meaning: 1.1. Railway undertaking – any private or public undertaking the main business of which is to provide rail transport services for freight and/or passengers with the requirement that the undertaking is to ensure traction; this also includes undertakings which provide only traction services; 1.2. Railway infrastructure - description and arrangement as foreseen in Chapter IV of this Law; 1.3. Railway infrastructure of common use – the railway infrastructure which is or has to be made accessible to all railway undertakings fulfilling the access conditions; 1.4. Railway infrastructure manager (IM) – the organizational unit which is responsible for development, maintenance and operation of railway infrastructure of common use including allocation of train-paths and charging their use as well as traffic regulation; the infrastructure management functions can be attributed to more than one organizational unit; 1.5. Intramodal competition - competition between two or more railway undertakings on the same railway infrastructure; 1.6. Railway license - a document which officially recognizes the ability of an undertaking to carry out the transport services by rail mentioned in it; 2 1.7. Safety certificate - the document by which the railway undertaking proves that it fulfills the conditions for safe traffic on specific railway lines or whole rail networks; 1.8. Safety authorization - the document by which an infrastructure manager proves that he fulfils the conditions for offering safe infrastructure services; 1.9. Private siding safety document - the document by which a private siding operator proves that he fulfils the conditions for operating his siding safely; 1.10. Train-path - the capacity of use of a determined part of the railway infrastructure within a certain time period; 1.11. Timetable - an instruction established by the infrastructure manager which determines the time of departure and arrival of trains at stations and other planned stops as well as the waiting time and other information that is important for safe railway traffic; 1.12. Network Statement - the statement which sets out in detail the general rules, deadlines, procedures and criteria for charging and capacity allocation schemes including such other information as is required to enable applications for infrastructure capacity. It is a catalogue of offered services established by the infrastructure manager and the conditions that have to be fulfilled in order to obtain access to the railway infrastructure; the mandatory contents are listed in Chapter V of this Law; 1.13. Railway services in the public interest (public services) - those performances of railway undertakings which are considered necessary for promoting the welfare of the country as a whole and which would not be carried out unless commissioned by public authorities; 1.14. Development of railway infrastructure - its construction or its modernization; 1.15. International Accounting Standards (IAS) - the internationally agreed criteria for company accounting, including balance sheet as well as profit and loss account, and their presentation, which gives the shareholders and the public fair and full information about the results of the economic activity, 1.16. Subsystems - the result of the division of the rail system, as shown in Annex 2 of Directive 2008/57/EC. They may be structural or functional; 1.17. Railway equipment - any technical component of the railway system; 1.18. National safety rules - all rules containing railway safety requirements issued by the body in charge of railway safety called also National Safety Body 3 and applicable to infrastructure managers, railway undertakings and railway siding operators; 1.19. Safety management system - the organization and arrangements established by an infrastructure manager or a railway undertaking to ensure the safe management of their operations; 1.20. Train - a composition of railway vehicles including traction; 1.21. Level crossing - the crossing of a Railway line with a road infrastructure at the same level; 1.22. Railway system - a connected whole consisting of railway infrastructure and of railway vehicles being operated on it; 1.23. Railway transport - the activity of running or shunting passenger and/or freight trains on the railway infrastructure; 1.24. International transport - transport of passengers or freight between the Republic of Kosovo and territories outside of it; 1.25. Transit transport - the international transport of passengers or freight passing through the territory of the Republic of Kosovo; 1.26. Public transport - a transport service offered under the same conditions to all passengers; 1.27. Interoperability - the ability of Kosovo railway infrastructure to allow safe and uninterrupted operation of conventional trains within, to and from Kosovo accomplishing the required levels of performance for the lines. This ability depends on all the regulatory, technical and operational conditions which must be met in order to satisfy the essential requirements; 1.28. Accident - an unwanted or unintended sudden event or a specific chain of such events which have harmful consequences; 1.29. Serious accident - any collision or derailment of trains, resulting in the death of at least one person or serious injuries to five or more persons or extensive damage to rolling stock, the infrastructure or the environment and any other similar accident with an obvious impact on railway safety regulation or the management of safety; 1.30. Extensive damage - damage that can immediately be assessed by the Investigating Unit to cost at least EUR 2 million in total; 4 1.31. Incident - any occurrence, other than accident or serious accident, associated with the operation of trains and affecting the safety of operation; 1.32. Train driver - a person capable and authorized to drive trains, including locomotives, shunting locomotives, work trains, maintenance railway vehicles or trains for the carriage of passengers or freight by rail in autonomous, responsible and safe manner; 1.33. Common safety targets - the safety levels that must at least be reached by different parts of the railway system and by the system as a whole, expressed in risk acceptance criteria; 1.34. Interoperability constituents - any elementary component, group of components, subassembly or complete assembly of equipment incorporated or intended to be incorporated into a subsystem upon which the interoperability of the trans-European rail system depends directly or indirectly; 1.35. Allocation of train path - the allocation of capacity of railway infrastructure of common use, by a path allocation body, who may be the manager of the railway infrastructure of common use; 1.36. Charging for use of railway capacity - charging for using paths allocated by a path allocation body to a railway train operating company or any other applicant. The charging body may be the path allocation body and the manager of railway infrastructure of common use; 1.37. Applicant - a railway undertaking and other persons or legal entities such as competent authorities for public services, and shippers, freight forwarders and combined transport operators with a public service or a commercial interest in procuring infrastructure capacity or train path ; 1.38. Infrastructure capacity - the potential to schedule train paths requested for an element of infrastructure for a certain period; 1.39. Essential requirements - the condition as set out in the EU Directive on Interoperability 2008-57 which must be met by the railway system, the subsystems and the interoperability constituents including interfaces; 1.40. Technical Specification for Interoperability (TSI) - a specification adopted in accordance with the EU Directive on Interoperability 2008-57, by which each subsystem or part of sub system is covered in order to meet the essential requirements and ensure the interoperability of the system; 1.41. Common Safety Methods (CSM) - the methods to be developed to describe how safety levels and achievement of safety targets and compliance with other safety requirements are assessed; 5 1.42. Railway Regulatory Authority of Kosovo - an independent institution which is responsible