India leases Russian nuclear submarine: Interfax
MOSCOW (AFP) Oct 21, 2004
India will receive a Russian nuclear submarine under a 10-year leasing deal that could be valued at tens of millions of dollars annually for Russia, Interfax news agency reported Thursday.
“India’s navy will lease a Project 971 nuclear-powered submarine for 10 years,” Interfax said, quoting an unnamed senior Russian defense industry official.
The contract for the deal was signed early this year and the submarine is still under construction at at the Amur shipyard in the Far East port of Komsomolsk-on-Amur, the report said.
“It is 85 percent completed,” the official said.
Interfax said independent experts believed the leasing contract was worth “as much as tens of millions of dollars per year,” but gave no further details on financing arrangements on the contract.
The report said construction of the submarine would be completed by 2007 after which an Indian crew would be sent to Russia for training aboard the vessel.
In April, Russia handed over to India a frigate, the third and last ship built by Russia for the Indian navy under a one-billion-dollar contract signed in 1997.
India is Russia’s traditional ally in southwest Asia, and the two countries have resumed cooperation in the nuclear power sphere following a visit by President Vladimir Putin to New Delhi in October 2000.
Last January, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov announced that Russia had reached a preliminary agreement to sell India an aircraft carrier along with 28 MiG-29K fighter jets in a deal worth around 1.5 billion dollars.
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