Russia cut national defense spending in 2015

Russia has significantly reduced spending on national defense, officials with the State Duma Committee on Defense said in a report about the implementation of last year's budget.

Photo: Source: Mil.ru

Thus, Russia cut national defense costs by 100.2 billion rubles in 2015. These costs will continue declining, the report also said.

"Defense spending for 2015 was approved in the budget in the amount of $3.187 trillion rubles, but were executed in the amount of 3.181 trillion rubles," the report said.

In April of 2015, during the optimization of budget expenses on national defense, the costs were cut by 166 billion rubles. Later in the autumn, after the verification of budget revenues, the costs on national defense were increased again by more than 65 billion rubles, which eventually resulted in their total reduction by 100 billion rubles.

According to a source in the Defense Ministry, the cost adjustments were made because of expenses on construction, procurement and maintenance.

Noteworthy, an increase on national defense spending in 2015 was the largest in post-Soviet history and amounted to 28.3% compared to 2014 . In 2014, similar expenses increased by 17.9%.

Pravda.Ru

Read article on the Russian version of Pravda.Ru