The governments of Indonesia and China have jointly agreed to conduct an in-depth assessment of the procurement of the SLR-66 OTH maritime radar to boost the security of sea lanes in the Indonesian archipelago.

Indonesian Defense Minister Purnomo Yusgiantoro informed ANTARA in Beijing on Tuesday that Indonesia and China will reevaluate the financing mechanism for the procurement of the radar.

“In short, Indonesia and China will review everything that is related to the procurement of the maritime spy radar,” he noted.

Minister Purnomo revealed that Indonesia will also reassess the necessary technical specifications for ensuring the security of sea lanes in the archipelago and the interoperability of the SLR-66 OTH radar with maritime patrol ships deployed by Indonesia.

“All this time, the sea lanes have been monitored using maritime patrol ships and airplanes of the Indonesian Navy,” he stated.

In order to beef up security of Indonesias large maritime territory, particularly in the eastern region, Purnomo asserted that the country needed the spy radar, which was offered by China.

Thus, during the three-day work visit to China, on September 21-23, Minister Purnomo also visited the China Educational Instrument and Equipment Corp (CEIEC) office, the enterprise that offered the spy radar to Indonesia.

On the occasion, the CEIECs Director, Qu Huimin, explained that the SLR-66 OTH spy radar has an active mode operational capability to monitor up to 280 kilometers and passive mode with a monitoring capability of 500 kilometers.

The SLR-66 OTH radar also operates from stationary stations, which must be located in the strategic sea lanes.

Besides the SLR-66 OTH, the CEIEC also manufactures air monitoring equipment (UAV with SAR and PAYLOAD types) and underwater detection radar.

(Antara)