With Russia’s sole aircraft carrier ‘Admiral Kuznetsov’ in a grim state, a Russian politician has suggested the country should buy the vessel’s refurbished sister ship, now known as the Liaoning, back from China, according to a report by Business Insider, which said the hull of the former Russian carrier, originally called Varyag, was bought from Ukraine in a shady Chinese deal after the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1990s.
The Kuznetsov was launched in 1985 but has suffered a string of calamities such as engine breakdowns, fires and bizarre shipyard accidents, and is now in such bad shape “it can neither move under its own power nor be towed, for fear that the ship might capsize, according to Ukrainian media”, the report said, and that was why Russian lawmaker Sergey Karginov has proposed buying the former Soviet aircraft carrier from China, although there seems little prospect of that happening given China uses the Liaoning as a training vessel.
Read the full report: Business Insider.
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