Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Air Force Chief Marshal Imam Sufaat said his side was considering buying Italian C-27j transport planes to replace the Air Force`s Fokker-27s that had been long used.

"We will see first from various aspects such as its operation requirements, technical specifications, logistics support and others so that it will really meet our needs," the air force chief said here on Wednesday.

He said that apart from C-27J spartan planes, the Air Force was also eyeing CN-295s which were produced by Indonesia`s PT Dirgantara, to replace its F-27s which had been used over the past 20 years.

The air force chief said that the procurement of airplanes would be focused on transport aircraft because in the coming five years there will be a lot of military operations. Wars need more transport planes, light middle or heavy ones.

Regarding the replacement of F-27s with CN-235s, Sufaat said that the air force already had six CN-235s which reinforced its light transport fleet.

"We also need a middle transport fleet. This could be met with the procurement of C-27j spartans. A CN-235 has the capacity to transport about thee tons of loads while a spartan is able to carry a load of up to 10 tons," the air force chief said.(*)

Editor: Aditia Maruli Radja
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