MOSCOW - Afghanistan's National Security Adviser Haneef Atmar held high level talks with his Russian counterpart Nikolai Patrushev on Tuesday and said, on twitter, that the Russian side expressed readiness to support the Afghan Air Force.
He said the Afghan delegation submitted its request for repairs and service of its Mi-35 helicopter fleet.
Atmar added that he held talks with 13 Russian military, diplomatic, security and economic ministries where he discussed the expansion of bilateral military and security ties in the fight against terrorism – especially regarding the provision of support to the Afghan National Defense Force.
In an interview with Sputnik on Monday, Atmar said Afghanistan was interested in enhancing its cooperation with Russia against international terrorism.
"The reason I am here is to ask Russia for help [fight Daesh]. Russian help was extremely helpful and effective [in fighting terrorism]," Atmar said.
He also told Sputnik that Kabul hoped for renewed cooperation between Russia and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on Afghanistan.
"NATO and Russia cooperation has been extremely well appreciated and evaluated effectively in Afghanistan. This NATO-Russian cooperation was very helpful. And we hope that this cooperation is resumed, because it is in the interests of all three parties, it is in the interest of Afghanistan and, Russia and NATO," Atmar said.
Speaking to Russia's TASS news agency earlier this week, Atmar said Afghanistan was interested in buying Russian-made Mi-35 combat helicopters to combat terrorists.
"We need combat helicopters and other weapons to rebuff terrorist groups acting in the Afghan territory more efficiently," he said.

"Now we have obsolete modifications of Russian combat helicopters. We would like to replace them by more modern Mi-35 rotorcraft and to organize training of pilots and technical personnel to service these helicopters. This is issue is of top priority importance for us at the moment."(Tolonews)