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| India-Pakistan |
| India signs defense deal with Israel |
| 2009-03-26 |
| (Xinhua) -- The Indian government has signed a massive 2 billion U.S. dollar defense deal with Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), local news website dnaindia.com reported Wednesday. The deal, which was signed into a contract this month, came at a time when India already possesses a more powerful missile in the same class -- the advanced air defense (AAD) missile, part of India's anti-ballistic missile shield, said the website. The website said that the deal, being kept under wraps, could sound the death-knell of the indigenous surface-to-air Akash missile system, into which millions have been invested over the years. More importantly, the deal ignores the success of the AAD missile, which could be deployed as a surface-to-air missile and used exactly like the Israeli missile system MRSAM. A senior defense ministry official, who defended the government on the contract, told the website that the MRSAM file was sent to the solicitor-general, who felt that the government could go ahead with the deal if it considered the missile essential. |
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