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Chinese Purchases Of Russian Weapons At Saturation Point
Moscow (AFP) Oct 13, 2006 Russia is to supply China with eight hi-tech anti-aircraft systems under a recently concluded deal, but Chinese interest in Russian defence equipment could be tailing off, a leading business newspaper here said Friday. China's latest purchase is eight S-300 PMU-2 Favorit air defence systems, the Vedomosti business daily quoted a spokesman for manufacturer Almaz-Antei, Yury Baikov, as saying. The systems are a new export model with a range of up to 200 kilometres (125 miles) and the capability of intercepting ballistic missiles, the newspaper said. The value of the deal was estimated at one billion dollars by military analyst Konstantin Makiyenko. China has been a major client for Russian weaponry, accounting for 60 percent of Russian arms exports last year, which in total were worth 6.12 billion dollars, the paper said, citing state statistics. Deliveries last year included five hi-tech submarines and a naval destroyer, while China agreed to buy 38 transport and refuelling planes, as well as a series of jet engines. But China may soon be fully stocked with Russian defence equipment and the only way to sell more would be through joint development of new technology, the paper said. "Experts warn that the purchase of a huge new batches of arms from Russian producers by the Chinese is becoming less and less likely. Keeping China as a major partner of Russia in the military technical cooperation can only be done with joint work on new kinds of weapons," the paper said. With the latest contract, China will have bought 28 of the Russian anti-aircraft systems, almost enough to cover all its major industrial centres, the paper said. In the naval sphere, Russia is about to transfer to China a fourth Project 956 destroyer, meaning that China's navy will have more destroyers than Russia's, which has three, the paper said, quoting military analyst Mikhail Barabanov. China's airforce is similarly fully stocked with Russian fighter jets, the paper said. "Militarily China is progressing at a fast pace and soon will clearly only be interested in new types of weapons. "In this situation Russia needs to activate joint work with China on such new systems as a fifth generation fighter jet.... But to jointly create new systems of weapons with a country that is not a military ally is not simple," the paper concluded.
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China, Germany Pledge To Further Military Exchanges
Beijing (XNA) Oct 07, 2006A senior Chinese military officer said here Saturday that China would like to further develop relations with Germany's Federal Defence Forces. Liang Guanglie, chief of general staff of China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) made the remarks in talks with visiting Inspector General of Germany's Federal Defence Forces Wolfgang Schneiderhan. |
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