HMS Ark Royal to be sold as scrap for £3 mn

London: HMS Ark Royal, an aircraft carrier and former flagship of the Royal Navy, will sold for three million pounds for scrap metal to help tackle a multi-billion pound defence deficit.

The removal of the Royal Navy`s former flagship from service in 2011, five years early, was a "difficult but necessary decision", the Ministry of Defence has said. An announcement on its future will be made in Parliament tomorrow, the BBC reported. More details about the deal are expected to be released during that announcement, it said. Sister ship HMS Invincible was also sold for scrap last year to a Turkish scrap metal firm. The Ark Royal - which was in service for 25 years - was put up for sale on the Ministry of Defence`s edisposals.Com website, which sells off kit to raise money to equip the armed forces with everything from aircraft to clothing. The ship, which led the UK`s naval forces during the invasion of Iraq, is the fifth vessel to carry the name - the first saw battle in 1588 against the Spanish Armada. The Ark Royal has been docked at Portsmouth Naval Base since it was decommissioned. One of the unsuccessful proposals had been to strip and sink the carrier for a diving site, put forward by Torbay- based dive group Wreck the World. PTI