Russian gunsmiths to press Americans from Mideast market

Last week, the US Department of State introduced sanctions against threeRussian weapon producers. The American 'black list' was supplemented by theTula Instrument-Making Design Bureau (KBP), the major company in the stateholding of precision weapons, which was being currently created.KBP has long been working on the creation of fifth generation specialequipment. About 80 companies of the Russian defense industry arefunctioning thanks to its achievements. It has the right to independentlysell its products on the international weapons market. Military engineersbelieve that this is one of the main reasons for the American diplomats'dislike for Tula gunsmiths. This is the second time that they areattempting to include KBP on the 'black list' quite groundlessly."Americans are just avenging themselves on us", the company's deputygeneral director for foreign trade Leonid Roshal said, "In the past decade,we outpaced American companies on the Mideast market three times, provingto Arab countries that our weapons are considerably better than any in theworld."KBP believes that its most successful contract was selling infantry combatvehicles (BMP-3) to the United Arab Emirates in the middle of 1990s. Today,the arms producer is testing new highly precise machines. For example, thisconcerns a fifth generation infantry combat vehicle. Additionally, KBP isworking at an antiaircraft defense system. The testing of it is personallycontrolled by Russian President Vladimir Putin. In addition, the massproduction of highly precise arms systems is being prepared. According tothe decision of the Russian government, they will be advertised and soldabroad. This means that Americans have grounds to fear KBP, the NovyeIzvestiya newspaper reported..