DUBAI, November 14. /TASS/. Factory testing of the light fighter jet MiG-35 will be completed this year, MiG Company Spokeswoman Anastasia Kravchenko said at the Dubai Airshow-2017 on Tuesday.

"Factory tests for the MiG-35 aircraft are to be completed this year. As soon as a serial contract is signed, we will start batch production at our plant in Lukhovitsy. At the moment we are waiting for a contract to be concluded with the Defense Ministry," she said.

As Chairman of the Federation Council’s (upper house) Defense and Security Committee, Viktor Bondarev, who up to September 2017 held the position of Russia’s Aerospace Force commander-in-chief, told TASS that the purchase of the MiG-35 plane has been included in the new program for armaments, adding that 24 such planes are to be acquired by 2020.

The MiG-35 is the newest multi-role generation 4++ fighter. Its predecessors are the MiG-29K/KUB and the MiG29M/M2. The flight test program began on January 26, 2017. The plane’s international presentation was held near Moscow the following day.

MiG CEO Ilya Tarasenko said Peru, Myanmar and Bangladesh had taken interest in the MiG-35.