The title of the article : :"Made-in-China airplanes may undermine sales of Russian high quality jets"
It didn't say extremely close in terms of capabilities. It could be anything and is open for any kind of interpretation.
Published 05 July, 2010, 22:52
Edited 22 July, 2010, 06:29
Russian and Chinese weapons manufacturers are clashing head on within the international arms market as China’s new fighter jet seems to be a cheaper imitation of the Russian original.
The argument is threatening to put on hold a multi-billion-dollar engines sale contract between the countries concerning the delivery of some hundreds Russian-made RD-93 engines needed for Chinese-Pakistani fighter jets called the
FC-1.
The deal is facing opposition from Russian aircraft manufacturers, such as
Mikhail Pogosyan, the head of the MiG and Sukhoi aviation holding, who said that the
FC-1 is extremely close, if not the same, as the Russian-made MiG-29. Pogosyan claimed that
FC-1 is a direct competitor to Russia's MiG-29 and the deal would incur losses for the Russian manufacturers.
A source quoted by the Kommersant newspaper said there are significant price differences keeping the US$10-million Chinese jets much cheaper than a $35-million Russian MiG-29.
Also, representatives from Russian Defense Export said that there was nothing wrong with re-exporting, which is in accordance with the decision of the Russian government. They added that there is no law that says there should be any agreement with Russian manufacturers citing the example of RD-33 that was re-exported to Egypt and was given permission by the Federal Service for Military and Technical Cooperation in 2007. These engines are sold to Bangladesh, Algeria and Saudi Arabia.
Ruslan Pukhov, the member of the Defense Ministry Public Council, disagrees with the officials.
Posting it again so that Blind people can read.........