NOVO-OGARYOVO, April 3 (RIA Novosti) - Russia should offer loans more often to help finance its global arms exports, but should lend money on the basis of market conditions and not ideology, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday.
“This must surely not be the type of loans that the Soviet Union used to provide, based on ideology and not on market values, in which it never saw the loans again," Putin said at a session of the State Commission For Military and Technical Cooperation with Foreign States. "Our work rests on a market basis and we must develop it. This is a normal world practice,” he added.
Some countries lack financial resources, Putin said, while others prefer to extend the service of existing military equipment and hardware, and some prefer to buy production licenses to develop their own military industry.
“This must be all taken into account during our work,” he told the commission. “These are the realities that we all should know and we must react promptly to all changes in the world.”
India is the leading purchaser of Russian arms, with Myanmar, Vietnam, Venezuela and Middle East countries also among the Russian defense industry's main clients.
