Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Thursday urged officials to speed up repairs of a Soviet-era aircraft carrier to be ready for delivery to India.
"We must finish it and sell it. Anything else would set a very poor precedent," Medvedev was quoted by news agencies as saying on a visit to the Sevmash shipyard on the White Sea in Russia's northern town of Severodvisnk.
Last year, India and Russia ended a protracted dispute over the cost to modernize the 44,570-tonne aircraft carrier, the Admiral Gorshkov, which will be sold to the Indian navy at an undisclosed price in 2011.
"We should consider this as a first and very trying experience," Medvedev said.
Russian export firm Rosoboronexport in 2004 signed a deal to refurbish the 30-year-old carrier for 970 million dollars, but last year demanded India pay an additional 1.2 billion dollars.
Since resolving the pricing dispute, India sent about 100 trained personnel to join the some 1,200 Russian engineers at the Sevmash shipyard working on the massive vessel, according to Indian officials.
Russia accounted for 70 percent of Indian arms supplies in 2008, but late deliveries and commercial disagreements have led New Delhi to turn to suppliers such as Israel, Britain, France and the United States.
Russia is due to supply India this year with a nuclear submarine, the Nerpa, in which 20 people died after a toxic gas accident during a trial in 2008.
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