Russia, India set to step up anti-terror fight - defence minister

NEW DELHI, January 21. /TASS/. Russia and India are set to boost partnership in combating terrorism, visiting Russian Defence Minister General Sergey Shoigu said at talks with Indian counterpart Manohar Parrikar. “Our countries condemn strongly any terrorist acts and oppose a policy of double standards in the struggle against this evil,” the Russian minister noted. He valued highly current bilateral military-technical co-operation, noting that Russia and India reached the level of close production ties. “Production of a multi-purpose transport airplane, a fifth-generation fighter jet and several naval projects are in sight,” Shoigu said. Russian-Indian relations are strategic already for many decades and are based on a firm basis of mutual trust, mutual understanding and close ties between the nations of the two countries. “The results of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s last December visit to India and his talks with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi confirmed this once again,” Shoigu said. He recalled that at the summit the two leaders had adopted a plan to bolster Russian-Indian co-operation in the next decade which particularly plans broad military and military-technical co-operation. “Agreements reached at the top level open up new opportunities to develop co-operation between defence agencies of Russia and India,” Shoigu noted. “The course for building up diversified ties between our agencies remains unchanged,” he said he hoped for this. “We are ready to broaden co-operation,” the Russian defence minister pledged. Read more