Russian Tank's Success at Arms Show in Abu Dhabi

Russia's modernised tank T-72M has been an obvious success at the sixth international arms show, "IDEX-2003", which opened last Sunday in the capital of the United Arab Emirates.

This output of the Uralvagonzavod amalgamation is virtually the only combat tank at the fair because the other armour producers have brought to IDEX such hardware as special vehicles for landing troops and anti-terrorist groups, infantry fighting vehicles and self-propelled artillery installations.

This Urals armoured car which looked very effective in an opening parade won the hearts of a populous audience when it displayed its road performance in a five-minute exhibition run along a special route. Clear evidence of this is quite a number of high guests from Asian countries at today's display.

"Our tank has been recognized as the best fighting vehicle in the second half of the 20th century," said Nikolai Malykh, director-general of the Uralvagonzavod amalgamation. "Now that our works has done all its modernising, the tank has got characteristics similar to the newest tank T-90C armed with artillery and missiles." "Our tank has caused wide interest," Urals works representatives say. "With 40 degrees above zero outside, its crew was quick to overcome all the obstacles on the special route and proved that the Urals tank can operate in any weather conditions." As to the tankers, they admitted that the routes at the current exhibition are easier than the previous ones and regretted over the lacking possibility to demonstrate all the fighting capacities of the tank -- planned exhibition shooting has been canceled because of a pre-war situation around Iraq.