Ukraine will resume a program to create a new corvette for the Navy
Ukraine will resume a state sponsored defense program on the creation of a new corvette for the Navy. This was announced by Deputy Defense Minister Igor Pavlovsky, Interfax-Ukraine reports.
According to the Deputy Minister, in 2017, government funding for the ''Corvette'' program should amount to more than 1 billion hryvnia or $37 million.
According to Pavlovsky, currently the Defense Ministry is negotiating the re-assigning of the contract which was signed with the Chernomorsky Shipbuilding Yard signed in 2009.
"There are already four companies that want to build [the corvette].” he said, singling out from the contenders the cumulative State Research and Design Shipbuilding Center located in Mykolaiv.
The initial plan for the construction of four corvettes worth about $2 billion assumed the launch of the first of them, the Volodymyr Velyky, in 2015. The ship was laid at the Chernomorsky Shipbuilding Yard in 2010.
Earlier, the commander of the Naval Forces of Ukraine, Serhiy Hayduk, said the Navy plans to increase its fleet by 30 fighting units before 2020.