Reuters: Putin spokesman: no talks with Clinton on tanker deal

Reuters: RPT-UPDATE 1-Russia firm "will not bid" on U.S. air tanker deal

(Repeats to additional susbcribers)

* UAC "not planning to bid" for U.S. tanker contract

* Person quoted as source for deal "doesn't work" for agency

(Adds Shishkin comment, background)

By Gleb Stolyarov

MOSCOW, March 22 (Reuters) - Russia's state-run United Aviation Corporation (UAC) does not plan to bid for a $50 billion contract to replace the U.S. Air Force fleet of air tankers, a company source told Reuters on Monday.

John Kirkland, a Los Angeles-based attorney, had told various news media over the weekend that UAC would announce a joint venture on Monday with a U.S. defence contractor to enter the bidding for the lucrative tanker deal against Europe's EADS and Boeing Co .

However, a source at UAC said: "We do not have any plans to bid" for the contract.

The U.S. Air Force has been trying for nearly a decade to replace its fleet of Boeing-built KC-135 tanker aircraft, which are close to 50 years old. EADS, the parent company of Airbus, won a deal in 2008 to build an initial 179 tankers, only to have that award cancelled after auditors intervened.

Kirkland quoted Alexander Shishkin, whom he said worked for the Russian Federal Service of Military-Technical Cooperation, as saying the U.S.-Russian joint venture being formed to bid would be announced at UAC headquarters on Monday morning.

However Shishkin, when contacted by Reuters on Monday, said he "could not say anything". He would not even confirm he worked for the Federal Service of Military-Technical Cooperation.

"I cannot say anything until the bosses decide something," he said.

When asked if he represented Russia or the Russian Federal Agency for Weapons Sales, he said: "I am very sorry, I cannot speak right now as I am in a meeting. I cannot say anything right now."

An official at the agency said that there was nobody called Alexander Shishkin listed as working there.

Kirkland claimed that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had discussed a UAC bid for the air tanker contract at a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Moscow on Friday.

Clinton was visiting Moscow on Friday but officials did not mention at the time any discussions about a tanker bid. Clinton held a bilateral meeting with Lavrov on Thursday and met President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Friday separately.

Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov was flying to a provincial city on Monday and was not immediately available for comment.

Kirkland claimed that a Russian bid would be based on a widebody version of UAC's Ilyushin-96 aircraft, which he said would be called the Ilyushin-98.

Fewer than 30 Ilyushin-96 aircraft have been produced. The plane is considered technically inferior to Western competitors and Russian news media reported last year that production of the passenger variant had been cancelled although a cargo version is still in limited production.

There has never been any report in Russia of a new version of the Il-96 called the Il-98. (Reporting by Gleb Stolyarov and Guy Faulconbridge, writing by Michael Stott)

RIA: Russia’s United Aircraft Chief Fyodorov Denies U.S. Tanker Bid

By Gopal Ratnam and Lyubov Pronina

March 22 (Bloomberg) -- Russia’s United Aircraft Corp. isn’t planning to bid for the Pentagon’s $35 billion Air Force aerial-refueling tanker program, Chief Executive Officer Alexei Fyodorov said, contradicting U.S. media reports.

The Wall Street Journal reported March 19 that United Aircraft, the maker of Ilyushin transport planes, was preparing a bid to be announced as early as today. The Washington Post also wrote about the plan on March 20.

“This is utter nonsense,” Fyodorov said in a subsequent telephone interview with Bloomberg News. “UAC is not planning to take part in the tanker tender or set up a joint venture.”

Both media reports cited John Kirkland, an attorney at Luce Forward in Los Angeles who said a venture would be announced between United Aircraft and a small, unidentified U.S. defense contractor on March 22 and that he represented the group.

CEO Fyodorov, in the Bloomberg interview, said he wasn’t familiar with Kirkland. United Aircraft is Russia’s state- controlled holding company for airplane production.

“Either it’s all a huge misunderstanding” or a matter of the Russians not wanting to confirm the plan “until something is officially announced,” Kirkland said in a March 21 interview with Bloomberg. “If I’ve been duped, it’s a massive conspiracy, but anything is possible.”

“I’ve spoken with lots of people on the Russian side” including from United Aircraft, Kirkland said, adding that he was told Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had approved the plan to bid. “That’s consistent with what I’ve been told for the last six months,” he said.

Clinton Visit

Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said by telephone that he was unaware of any plans by United Aircraft to bid. The same was true of a U.S. State Department spokesman.

“To my knowledge there was no discussion of a Russian company bidding for the Pentagon tanker contract” during U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit to Moscow last week, department spokesman Philip Crowley said on March 21.

Crowley said he was present in Clinton’s meetings. During the talks, “Russian leaders expressed an interest in a joint cargo aircraft project, but it was not specific,” he said.

The U.S. Department of Defense is seeking bidders to build a fleet of aerial refueling tankers, replacing aircraft that have been in service since the mid-1950s. Boeing Co. this month was left as the only bidder after Northrop Grumman Corp. pulled out of a team that included European Aeronautic, Defence & Space Co., which currently is mulling whether to bid on its own.

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said in a March 19 e-mail that the Department of Defense welcomed all “qualified bidders” to compete for the contract.

To contact the reporters on this story: Gopal Ratnam in Washington at gratnam1@bloomberg.net; Lyubov Pronina in Moscow at lpronina@bloomberg.net;

March 22, 2010 09:24

21.03.2010, 17.52

NEW DELHI, March 21 (Itar-Tass) -- India has successfully test fired a BrahMos supersonic anti-ship missile from a warship in the Bay of Bengal, off the Orissa coastline. BrahMos Aerospace, a joint venture of India and Russia, produces the missile.

The Sunday test launch took place from the INS Ranvir, BrahMos Aerospace CEO Dr. Sivathanu Pillai said, adding that the missile hit the target.

Indian President Pratibha Patil and Defense Minister A. K. Antony congratulated the company on the successful test.

Russia’s Yantar shipyard in the Kaliningrad region is building three frigates for the Indian Navy, and all of them will be equipped with BrahMos missiles. Besides, BrahMos Aerospace keeps working on the air-based modification of the missile, which may be installed in the Sukhoi Su-30MKI.

The missile named after two main rivers of India and Russia, Brahmaputra and Moscow River, has been put to service in India. The missile can hit targets on the range of 300 kilometers.

BrahMos Aerospace is developing a hypersonic modification of the missile, which will travel at the velocity five times higher than the speed of sound and become totally unreachable for interceptors.

RTT News: Afcons Infra Bags Metro Project Contract From KMRC

http://www.rttnews.com/Content/IndianNews.aspx?Id=1246583&SM=1

3/22/2010 2:20 AM ET Afcons Infrastructure, the infrastructure arm of the Shapoorji Pallonji Group, has bagged a contract for Rs.938 crore from the Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation or KMRC to construct the final underground portion of the East-West metro corridor project from Central Station to Howrah Maidan, reports say.

Afcons, in a joint venture with a Russia's Transtonnelstroy Ltd., will build three underground stations and twin bored tunnels. The length of the tunnel will be around 2,954 meters; of this, around 520 meters will be under the Hooghly river.

Earlier this month, ITD Cementation Ltd., was awarded the Rs.909-crore contract to build the underground section from Subhas Sarobar to Central Station. Afcons will construct the remainder of the line from Central Station to Howrah Maidan.

Afcons Director (Transportation) Ramakrishna V. Ramanan reportedly said this project would be a boon to commuters travelling from Howrah to Kolkata.

KMRC is a joint venture of the West Bengal government and the Union Urban Development Ministry developing the Rs.4676.40-crore East-West metro corridor project, which includes a 5.7 km-long elevated section and an 8-km-long underground segment.

Gammon India and Simplex were awarded, respectively, contracts for viaducts and elevated stations.

The elevated section of the East-West corridor is expected to be operational by October 2013, and the entire metro line is likely to be in service by December 2014.

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