MOSCOW - The Russian Air Force is interested in producing Antonov An-70 aircraft, Russian Air Force Commander Col. Gen. Alexander Zelin told Interfax-AVN.
"We’ve been dealing with this intensively and we have signed an agreement to resume production of the Antonov An-70 tactical plane," Zelin said, noting that he supervises this Russian-Ukrainian project personally.
"My group is working in Kyiv, in Ukraine," he said.
Zelin also said that the armed forces would become mobile only if the military transport aviation gets a proper fleet of aircraft.
"Therefore, the state armaments program and the General Staff’s instructions confirm that we need to have a fleet of military-transport aircraft capable of dealing with emergencies. We must be ready to tackle tasks set to the Russian armed forces in any part of Russia or beyond its borders, in our allies’ territory," Zelin said.
The Russian government’s military-industrial commission recently gathered in Ulyanovsk under the chairmanship of Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin to discuss the development of military-transport aviation, he said.
"All priorities have been defined. We are developing our own ‘solder-aircraft’ for the military-transport aviation – Ilyushin IL-76 in the Il-476 modification at our construction plants in Ulyanovsk. It is a qualitatively new plane, although it looks like the Il-76," the general said.
"Concurrently, Il-76s are being upgraded in order to enhance the air fleet’s combat capabilities," Zelin said.
"We are also re-launching the production of Antonov An-124 heavy military-transport planes," he said.
