India is developing a 5,000 km-range Agni ballistic missile, Defence Minister A.K. Antony said on Friday.
“India has reached an appreciable level of competence in missile technologies, with a reach capability of 3,500 kilometres. Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is developing Agni missile with a capacity to reach 5000 kilometres,” he said here.
The Defence Minister was addressing a conference of heads of DRDO laboratories.
Under its missile development programme, India is developing ballistic missiles with longer ranges and had recently successfully test-fired the 3,500 km-range Agni-III missile from a launch facility. The Agni-series also includes missile variants with ranges between 700 and 2,500 km.
The 5,000 km-range Agni-V is a further advancement of the existing systems and is expected to be test-fired later this year, sources said.
Other missiles developed by the DRDO are the Prithvi and its variants with ranges upto 350 km, surface-to-air Akash missile defence system with a range of 25-30 km and the short-range anti-tank NAG missile.
Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance
