Short answers, pulled from the story.
Russian Railways was established on the 18th of September 2003, when a government decree separated railway operations from the Ministry of Railways. The company was formally registered as a joint-stock company under Decree No. 585 later that October.
Gennady Fadeyev, who had served as the Russian Railways Minister, became the first president of JSC Russian Railways on the 23rd of September 2003. He held the post until the 14th of June 2005.
The Sapsan is a high-speed train that commenced service in December 2009, connecting Saint Petersburg, Moscow, and Nizhny Novgorod. It is operated by Russian Railways using trains manufactured by the German company Siemens, and by 2010 it was running with an occupancy rate of 84.5 percent.
As of November 2025, Russian Railways was reported to be in debt of approximately four trillion rubles, equivalent to around $50.8 billion. The debt grew sharply due to declining freight traffic, international sanctions, and falling industrial demand.
Vladimir Yakunin was dismissed as president of Russian Railways in August 2015, with official reasons citing poor performance and mismanagement. He had held the position since the 14th of June 2005, and his tenure was marked by a Reuters investigation into $22.5 billion in 2012 procurement activities linked to alleged shell companies and associates of Yakunin.
As of the 31st of December 2009, the total operational length of the Russian Railways network was 85,281 kilometres. The network is divided into 16 regional branches, stretching from the Kaliningrad Railway in the west to the Far Eastern Railway managed from Khabarovsk.