Military technical cooperation between Indo-Russia improving, says Putin

Visiting President Vladimir Putin said Saturday the military cooperation between India and Russia is improving as now Moscow is not just supplying military equipments to New Delhi but is also looking forward to manufacturing the same jointly.

Addressing a joint press conference with Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the bilateral talks and signing of MoUs, Putin said, "Military technical cooperation is improving. Russia is not only supplying military equipments and ordinance but is also opening joint production of the most modern military equipment. We have plans to have Indian production of multi target helicopters."

"There are negotiations going on about the latest production of civil aircraft Sukhoy Superjet 100 as well as about joint development of regional passenger aircraft," Putin said.

He said that apart from business and military ties, humanitarian ties will also be improved with cultural exchanges, events and expos.

The Russian President said that fighting terrorism is one of the most top priorities of both nations.

He also congratulated India for the completion of the second reactor unit of the Kudankulam nuclear power station reaching its full capacity and the launching of construction works in the third and fourth reactor units of the nuclear power plant.

"Being built using the most modern Russian technology with participation of our specialists, this nuclear power plant will be a very significant contribution to energy security of India and increase its energy sufficiency. It will add additional impetus to global and national economy of India," said Putin.

He assured that Russia will further continue to enhance cooperation in the energy and other sectors.

"We are going to expand our bilateral cooperation not only in the energy sector but also across the board. Russia and India are specially privileged strategic partners," he said.

Talking about bilateral trade between the two sides, Putin said, "We have noted with satisfaction that bilateral trade is dominated by high added value products such as engineering and industrial processing. We have agreed to improve our efforts to bring back the dynamic growth in our trade."

He said that Russia sees great perspective in forming a free trade zone between the Eurasian Economic Council and India, adding that experts and businesses support such an agreement.

"We hope the decisions to begin the negotiations will be made by the leadership of Eurasian Council already in Moscow at the next meeting of the Eurasian Economic council. We are going to improve bilateral investment ties with India. Over the past year, the accumulated mutual investments reached 12 billion dollars. So, we are really close to the 2025 target goal of investments which is 15 billion dollars," he added.

The Russian President further said the intergovernmental commission is working actively in this direction and has agreed upon 20 large investment projects in infrastructure, innovation and civic construction fields.