Friday, November 25 2005 10:19 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Moscow: India and Russia are not planning to sign any deal on the joint development of fifth generation (5G) fighter during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Moscow early next month, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov said yesterday (Nov 24, 2005).

"We are not planning to sign the (5G fighter) agreement during the visit of the Indian Prime Minister," Ivanov was quoted as saying by RIA Novosti.

He clarified that the two countries were planning to sign a bilateral agreement on the development of a military transport plane during the Indian Prime Minister's Moscow visit scheduled for December 4 to 7.

Earlier last week during their talks here, visiting Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Ivanov had finalised the long-pending military Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) agreement and accord on the joint development and production of 145 medium range multi-role transport aircraft (MTA), which would be signed during the Indian Prime Minister's visit.

In Moscow, Mukherjee for the first time had clearly stated India's willingness to jointly develop and produce 5G super fighter with Russia from a scratch and invited RAC MiG to present its project before the Indian Air Force's top brass.

Unlike the Russian Air Force, which has short listed the project of MiG rival Sukhoi for the fifth generation fighter, IAF is in favour of a lighter fighter and is looking forward to MiG presentation.