NEW DELHI, May 29: The reported Russian threat recently to lift its arms embargo on Pakistan and start selling it military hardware in the event of India purchasing Russian T-72 tanks from the Czech Republic has now decreased with the Indo-Czech deal falling through.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) is not conducting active negotiations with the Czech company Omnipol which offered to sell around 200 Russian T-72 tanks to India.

Earlier this year, India and Omnipol were exploring the possibilities of a deal. However, by the time India renewed interest in the deal after three months, Omnipol had already sold the same set of tanks to an African country.

Instead the Czechs offered India another set of T-72 tanks which were not of Russian origin but of multiple origin. Apparently, India did not find this new offer attractive. According to experts, the problem of using tanks from different countries poses maintenance problems relating to an increase in inventory holding costs. It would make the standardisation of spares and their `scaling' for replacement difficult to formulate.

Meanwhile, the Russian embargo on Pakistan has a bearing on the latest Ukraine-Pakistan T-80 tank deal which is underway. Russia makes the gun assemblies for the Ukrainian tanks which enables Moscow to stall the Ukraine-Pakistan deal. However, Ukraine has already supplied Pakistan around 50 tanks as spare gun assemblies may have been available to that country.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.