DHAKA: The Russian firearms company Kalashnikov will start setting up a joint assembly facility in India in 2014.

Kalashnikov CEO Alexei Krivoruchko told journalists on Friday, The Voice of Russia publishes this report on Saturday.

‘I think we will start building a production facility in India this year. It’s going to be an assembly line at the first stage, and we plan to reach a figure of 50,000 items a year,’ Krivoruchko said.

He described India as ‘an extremely promising market’.

Russia’s Kalashnikov Concern is in talks with several Indian companies on setting up joint ventures to produce small arms and high-precision weaponry, a company official said Thursday.

‘India for us is a market with high potential… and we are marketing here all weapons on our production list, including assault rifles, sniper rifles and high-precision weapons,’ Andrei Baryshnikov, Kalashnikov exports director, said at the DEFEXPO INDIA-2014 exhibition in New Delhi.

BDST: 1358 HRS, FEB 08, 2014