Ukraine's refusal of defense contracts with Russia will ruin the Ukrainian industry, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said.
“For them, supplies from Zaporizhia, from Dnipropetrovsk, from
Mykolaiv, from Kyiv, as far as engine-making, aircraft building, and
space are concerns – mean tens of thousands of jobs, this is absolutely
the only budget they can accumulate now,” Rogozin said at a meeting with
university students in Novosibirsk on Friday.
Ukraine’s claims about Russian military hardware being used against them are baseless, he said.
“If they mean the vote in Crimea, which defense company was it made by?” Rogozin asked.
Ukraine’s refusal of supplies means “big problems,” he said. It is
difficult for Russia to do business with a country in which the
situation changes so rapidly, he said.
“On the question of defense building, we cannot depend on a country that is in a constantly changing state,” Rogozin said.
A possible alternative for Russia is to develop a system of science
parks and import substitution which could help resolve the issue of
supplying parts critical to national security, he said.
“Regrettably, everything has to be decided on the move. We will solve these problems,” he said.
