ST. PETERSBURG, Jan. 18 (Xinhua) – Electric vehicles can continue to drive free of charge on federal toll highways in 2024, the Russian government’s press service said Thursday.

Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov, who supervises the federal project “Electric and hydrogen car,” said that the privilege for electric vehicles will resume on Jan. 19.

The country’s experimental project on the free passage of electric vehicles on toll sections of federal highways was launched on March 1 and ended on Dec. 31 last year. The program was an incentive for Russians to purchase electric vehicles.

Belousov said about 5,000 motorists took advantage of the privilege during this period.

Sales of new electric vehicles in Russia in 2023 amounted to a record of slightly more than 14,000 units, 4.7 times more than a year earlier, the country’s analytic agency Autostat reported.