Chief of the General Staff Nikolai Makarov told Russian media that the army already had too many of the weapons in its stores.
A new model is expected to be ready by the end of the year.
News of the army's decision is reportedly being kept from the rifle's designer, Mikhail Kalashnikov, now 91.
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“We do not want to take it upon ourselves to tell him,” an unnamed member of his family told Russia's Izvestia newspaper.
“It might kill him.”
A spokesman for the rifle's developer, the Izhmash plant in central Russia, told Izvestia newspaper that a new model would be ready for demonstration by the end of the year. Read more
Source: bbcnews.com
Resources for Military Gun Collectors
The Standard Catalog of Military Firearms
The Greatest Guns of Gun Digest
Flayderman's Guide to Antique American Firearms and Their Values
Gun Digest 1944 – 2009 3-DVD Set
