'India to sign deal to buy T-90s this month'

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW, APRIL 3. India will sign a contract for the purchase of Russia's main battle tanks, T-90, before the end of this month, a Russian daily has reported.

Under the contract, India would receive 100 T-90 tanks within a year and build another 220 under licence at the Heavy Vehicles Factory in Avadi, the Russian business daily Vedomosti said on Monday, quoting an unnamed ``ranking official'' from Russia's main arms exporter, Rosvooruzheniye.

The deal, worth $ 700 million, had been approved by the Indian Ministry of Defence despite problems that arose during comprehensive field trials of T-90 in India last year, the paper said. It claimed that three T-90s had scored low marks in missile firing tests and one tank engine had broken down during desert trials in scorching heat.

The decision to buy the tanks was taken because India wanted to offset acquisition by Pakistan of Ukraine's T-80 UD tanks.

The deal will give the T-90 manufacturer, Uralvagonzavod, funds to launch the production of Russia's new tank, T-95, which the Defence Minister, Marshal Igor Sergeyev, recently described as ``one of the most promising projects'' of the Russian defence industry, the newspaper said.

Out of India's 3,400 tanks, 2,200 are Russian-built and include 700 T-55s and 1,500 T-72s, the paper said.

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Section  : International
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