India, Russia ink inter-governmental agreement on military-technical cooperation for 2021-30

New Delhi: India and Russia on Monday signed an inter-governmental agreement on a programme for military-technical cooperation for 2021-2030, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

The document was inked in the presence of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu.

The chief of Russia’s federal service for military technical cooperation, Dmitry Shugayev and the Indian Defense Ministry’s Additional Secretary and Director General for Acquisition Kantha Rao put their signatures to the document.

The Russian Defense Ministry said the agreement provided for cooperation by arms and services and also the supplies and development of armaments and other military hardware.

Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, in tweets, said that India deeply appreciates Russia’s strong support for India and that both sides inked a number of agreements and contracts.

“India deeply appreciates Russia’s strong support for India. We hope that our cooperation will bring peace, prosperity and stability to the entire region.

“Glad that a number of Agreements/Contracts/Protocols were signed pertaining to small arms and military cooperation.”He also said that both sides held productive and substantive discussions.

“Had a productive, fruitful and substantial bilateral discussions on defence cooperation with the Russian Defence Minister, General Sergey Shoigu in New Delhi today. India values its special and privileged strategic partnership with Russia,” he posted after talks with his Russian counterpart Sergey Shoigu.

"India is one of Russia's key partners in the defence sector, and bilateral relations are of a particularly privileged, strategic nature," Shoigu said in remarks at the Inter-governmental commission on military and military-technical cooperation.(UNI)