Sunday, January 30 2005 09:20 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Jerusalem: Israel is backtracking on its commitment made to India over "reciprocal procurement" of defence-related items, wavering over the purchase of Pilotless Target Aircraft (PTA), 'Lakshya', and Advanced Light Helicopter, 'Dhruv'.

"The Indian UAV (Lakshya) was one of the many options that were examined some months ago. The final evaluation of the various aspects of each proposal included technical and cost parameters.

In that examination, budget constraints dictated a choice of the American UAV", Rachek Niedek Ashkenazi, spokesperson of the Israeli defence Ministry, told sources in Jerusalem.

The Jewish State had shown interest in buying some 20 Lakshyas from India two years ago when it was trying to cement its growing defence ties with New Delhi.

It also paid India for conducting extensive trials but has ever since remained silent on the issue choosing to ignore every time a visiting Indian defence delegation raised the matter.

Jerusalem is now leaning towards inducting American Chakor PTA system and the KD-2R5 PTAs.

"However, it should be noted that there are other areas of co-operation. One such project is the Dhruv, advanced light helicopter (ALH), which is a joint project of Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) and Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI)", Ashkenazi said.