Russia plans to spend 186 bln dollars on arms by 2015

MOSCOW, June 2 (Reuters) Russia will spend 186 billion dollars on buying arms between next year and 2015, Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov was today quoted as saying.

"Over nine years almost 5 trillion roubles will be apportioned," Interfax news agency quoted him as telling a meeting of the government military-industrial commission, which he heads.

"What matters is what the money is spent on, that it is spent effectively," Ivanov, also a deputy prime minister, added.

He gave no further details. Domestic orders would be a boost to an arms industry that is fighting to recover from a post-Soviet decline.

General Yuri Baluyevsky, head of Russia's General Staff, said last year he feared the domestic arms industry might not be large enough to supply the armed forces by 2011.

The arms export trade, however, is lucrative for Russia,earning it some 6 billion dollars last year. Almost half of the sales went to China. India, Syria, Iran, Venezuela and Myanmar are also buyers.

REUTERS DKS RR VV1718