Russia to Supply Over $2.2bln Weapons to Libya
Russia’s state weapons exporter, Rosoboronexport, is elaborating a contract to sell weapons to Libya for a total worth of more than $2.2 billion. Libya that has purchased no armaments of Russia for over 15 years may emerge as one of ten top buyers now. The bulk of the acquisition will be formed by air defense systems, more powerful than needed for regional conflicts. The contract for weapons delivery to Libya could be sealed already this year, during the visit of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin to Tripoli. The budget of the deal will exceed $2.2 billion. Russia is expected to pardon Libyan debt, and Tripoli will undertake to widen cooperation in fuel, energy and nuclear fields in addition to military and engineering contacts. The parties, however, still disagree about the actual amount of the debt. Moscow insists on $4.4 billion, while Tripoli acknowledges no more than $1.723 billion.

The sources say Libya is mostly interested in air defense systems – four batteries of S-300PMU-2 long-range antiaircraft missile systems and around 20 Top-M1 short-range antiaircraft missile systems. Moreover, Tripoli is willing to buy 12 Su-30MK2 fighters, 12 MiG-29SMT fighters and one or two submarines of Project 636. It is also ready to pay for repairing two guard-ships and a small-size missile ship that were supplied earlier.

For Russia, Libya will probably become the second country of North Africa in budget of military contracts. The leader is Algeria (around $8 billion), and Russia also supplies air defense systems to Morocco and negotiates the delivery of air defense systems and MiG-29SMT fighters to Egypt.