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Brazil to sign military cooperation treaty with France

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-09-23 09:27

RIO DE JANEIRO -- Brazil's Defense Minister Nelson Jobim announced Monday that the country would sign a military cooperation treaty with France in December.

Jobim said under the treaty, to be signed during the upcoming visit of French President Nicolas Sarkozy to Brazil, France would provide technology for the construction of Brazil's first nuclear submarine and training for the Brazilian troops.

"Brazil has the fuel. The agreement with France is for the construction of the non-nuclear part of the submarine," said the minister, "President Sarkozy will come to Brazil at the end of the year and will sign the treaty on December 22 or 23."

The nuclear submarine has become one of Brazil's priorities since the discovery of the pre-salt layer oil fields off the country's southeastern and southern coast, which would turn Brazil into one of the world's major oil producers.

Jobim made the announcement in Itapemirim, southeast Espirito Santo state, where he monitored the military maneuvers coded as Operation Atlantic, an exercise in which Brazil's armed forces simulate a war over the control of the pre-salt layer oil fields.