Russian President Dmitry Medvedev acknowledged his country's plans to lease a nuclear submarine (Nerpa/Akula II) to India on Thursday, December 4. The price of a 10-year lease was fixed at $650 million.
December 04, 2008, (Sawf News) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev acknowledged his country's plans to lease a nuclear submarine (Nerpa/Akula II) to India on Thursday, December 4.
Speaking to the press on the eve of his departure to India on a state visit starting December 5, Medvedev said:
"We are talking also about cooperation in the sphere of leasing atomic submarines. This is also an important and highly technological area of cooperation… [and] we are willing to enhance cooperation in this field as well."
Asked if the Nerpa accident could have a negative impact on the lease, Medvedev replied:
"There is no negative impact on our relations, because unfortunately, this tragic accident, which is now under investigation, according to the information that we have at present, was a result of the so-called human factor and it does not characterize the current state of this project or of this nuclear submarine."
Doubts were cast about the Nerpa deal when on a visit to India earlier this year Russian defense minister Anatoly Serdyukov, when quizzed on the deal, said, "The press discusses lots of things. We do not export nuclear submarines."
India is reported to have leased the Nerpa nuclear submarine from Russia under a contract signed in 2004 by Russia's then-Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov during his visit to India. The price of a 10-year lease was fixed at $650 million.
The submarine is earmarked to be commissioned as INS Chakra.
A special training centre was built at Sosnovy Bor, near St. Petersburg, and has since produced three Indian relief crews. The centre also looks to a busy future: it will train crews for Indian-built SSNs.
On November 8, the submarine was involved in a serious accident while undergoing sea trials with the Russian Pacific Fleet, in which 20 people were killed and another 21 injured.
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