MOSCOW, February 19. /TASS/. Russia has acquired extensive expertise in unmanned aircraft and it should use this experience also in the civilian sector, Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council and Chairman of the United Russia party, said in an interview with Sergey Stillavin for the Mayak radio station.
When asked whether the developments made for the Russian army are being used in the civilian sector, Medvedev replied: "Of course."
The politician noted that that until recently, Russia "was not a leader" in terms of developing unmanned aircraft systems.
"We were only just beginning to work on this after the start of the special military operation. And now, it's quite clear, we've acquired extensive expertise in the field of unmanned aerial vehicles, from small unmanned aerial vehicles, drones, and copters to large aircraft systems. All of this can and should be used in the civilian sector, because we have a vast country and there are a multitude of tasks that drones can perform," the politician said.
According to Medvedev, this is just one area, and it's absolutely indicative, but there are other areas that can and should be explored: new materials and various complex technological devices that can be used in both the civilian and defense sectors.
"I'll give you a nice but quite obvious example: the laser. Until recently, this was a science fiction thing, described in particular in [a science-fiction novel by Alexey Tolstoy] 'The Hyperboloid of Engineer Garin,' and so on. Nowadays lasers are also used in the civilian sector. But in this particular situation, lasers are now also used in warfare. So, this is an example of how civilian technology is moving in the defense direction," he went on.
Such exchanges exist constantly, the politician pointed out.
"And it's sometimes difficult to say which is primary. But this is very important for the development of both the civilian and defense industries," he concluded.