EASTERN RAILWAYS EXPLOITATION COMPANY: Baron Maurice de Hirsch had founded the company in 1873 the Compagnie Generale d' Exploitation des Chemins de Fer de la Turquie d' Europe (General Company for Operation of European Turkey Railways), based in Paris and as a main task the exploitation of networks of the Othomanic Empire that were in Europe. These were the lines Istanbul - Adrianople length 319 km, Adrianople - Alexandroupolis length 149 km, Thessaloniki - Skopje length 243 km, Banja Luka - Bosanski Novi length 102 km and Adrianople - Serabey. Hirsch on 23 December 1879 set up a new company based in Vienna this time, with the name Compagnie d' Exploitation des Chemins de Fer Orientaux (CO) which undertakes entirely the operation of the lines of his previous company. On 30 June 1910 the company's headquarters were moved to Istanbul and thus acquired the Othoman nationality. After the end of WWI and the Treaty of Lausanne (24 July 1923) which defined the borders between Greece and Turkey, CO had under its operation only the lines that existed within Turkey. On 25 December 1936 the CO company is nationalized and absorbed by the Turkish TCDD Railways, so it ceases to exist.