VINA DEL MAR (Chile). Dec 2 (Interfax-AVN) - The Russian shipbuilding industry is capable of building helicopter carriers of the French Mistral kind for the Russian Navy, Military Industrial Commission board member Vladimir Pospelov told Interfax-AVN.
"If this decision is made within the framework of new programs, a project of the Mistral kind will be efficiently implemented by enterprises of the Russian shipbuilding industry," Pospelov said.
There are two crucial conditions for building helicopter carriers, and they are not related to the industrial potential of Russia's defense sector, he said.
"The first one is the political will and the demand for such ships, and the second is the financing of such programs," Pospelov said.
The disrupted Mistral project between Russia and France gave domestic shipbuilders a unique experience of the construction of large ships at two shipyards in various parts of the globe. "We can use this experience here if we need it," Pospelov said.
Russia has acquired an industrial zone which will soon surpass the French shipyards in Saint Nazaire, the Zvezda plant in Bolshoi Kamen in the Primorye territory, he said.
"The final stage has begun in the design of a large dry dock. This plant is meant to be much cooler than the Saint Nazaire shipyards where a Mistral ship was under construction for Russia," Pospelov said.
He took part in the Exponaval 2016 international naval show, which ends in Chile on Friday.