Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will sign a contract to buy 24 Russian Sukhoi fighter jets during his visit to Russia, the Venezuelan ambassador in Moscow said on Monday.

"The contract will most likely be signed during the president's next visit to Russia, which runs from July 25 to 27," the official Bolivian news agency quoted Alexis Navarro as saying.

He added that Venezuela's military chiefs had been very pleased with the Russian planes.

On Friday, Alexei Fiordorov, head of the board at Irkut, which manufactures the Sukhoi planes, told Russian news agency Interfax that the company would soon sign a contract with Venezuela.

On June 4, Chavez said in his radio and television program "Alo Presidente" that he hoped to sign the contract soon.

Source: Xinhua