UAV - Våpenløs Predator

General Atomics Gets $200M Predator XP Contract from UAE

Posted on February 19, 2013 by The Editor

The UAE’s armed forces have agreed to buy an undisclosed number of Predator UAS, from privately-owned U.S. firm General Atomics in a deal worth $200M (722 million dirhams).

“UAS are significant for any armed forces in present times. There is a lot of demand for these,” Major General Obeid al-Ketbi told reporters at IDEX, the largest arms exhibition in the Middle East, held in Abu Dhabi.
The UAE awarded the contract to purchase the aircraft to a local company, International Golden Group, which will buy them from the U.S. firm. The deal marks General Atomics’ first sale of an unarmed version of its Predator in the Middle East
The UAE and Saudi Arabia are among several countries, according to diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks, asking U.S. officials to buy armed UAS but which have been rebuffed.
Washington says its commitments to the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), a non-binding international agreement designed to limit the spread of long-range precision weaponry, restrict UAS exports.
General Atomics’ export-variant Predator will have no “hard points” to attach missiles and would be deliberately engineered to make adding new weaponry impossible, the company said last year.