Venezuela is going to purchase at least 12 new Sukhoi fighters for its armed forces, President of the country Nicolas Maduro said. He delivered a speech at Libertador air base (Aragua state), where he honored the memory of two pilots of Su-30 fighter, which crashed on September 17th 2015 near the border with Columbia, TASS reports.
“I’ll talk to President Vladimir Putin in order to bring at least 12 new Sukhoi fighters to replace the crashed one; we are going to keep fighting the drug traffic and protect our country,” Maduro said.
He added that new military equipment would also be delivered to the country by China under previously signed agreements; this will help strengthen the country’s armed forces. “I have ordered to fight the drug traffic in the air, on the ground and at sea, wherever it comes from, first of all, from Colombia,” Maduro noted.
According to the Ministry of Defense of Venezuela, the crashed Su-30 fighter was going to intercept an aircraft moving in the direction of Colombia. Presumably, it was a light aircraft owned by drug mafia. The cause of the crash is unknown. It is expected that the found flight data recorder will help find out the reasons for this accident. In accordance with the President’s decision the pilots were awarded with the rank of Major of the air forces.
