Not just one but a pair of brand new Airbus A400M Transport plane
has recently been offered by French Government to Philippines for the disaster
relief operations. The remarkable offer was made by the French President
Francois Hollande at Palais de l’Elysee in Paris to the Philippine President as
it signed the updated bilateral Defense Cooperation Agreement (DCA) with Philippines.
As of now, no further details were
available, but according to our insider sources in the Paris that the sale
could be in form of Official Government Assistance (ODA) from French government
which will be financing the acquisition of said aircraft similar to the
Rosenbauer firetruck purchases which was secured via loan grant from the
Austrian government.
Philippines and France Defense
Cooperation Agreement was signed by Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin and the French
Minister of Defense Jean—Yves Le Drian.
“Philippines are now in the
process of modernizing its armed forces and improving defense capability, and
we believe that France will be a reliable partner in this regard,” said
by President Aquino in a Press release.
Pierre Jaffre on of the Airbus
executive vice president for the Asia Pacific said that it sees the possibility
of selling €150 million worth A400M military transport plane to Philippine
military. If this will be approved, Philippines could be the second country in
ASEAN after Malaysia to order the said aircraft. Currently Philippines operate 5
refurbished C—130 aircraft for disaster relief.
No comments:
Post a Comment