Is it to keep the russians off the FAA/JAA market, or are these helicopters really that far away of our standards?
We sometimes tend to believe that Europe is so important that everyone will want to sell helicopters here
But from my discussions with the Russian Kazan helicopters that they are not really very interested in certifing the Mi17 in Europe. Mainly because of cost and that the market is not big enough for return on the investment. They are also concerned that western operators and customers would be biased against Russian helicopters and that it would be a tough market to come into anyway.