THe IMBEL MD97 is an assault rifle intended for use in Brazil's Army, Special Forces, and domestic police forces.

History

The MD97 is a Brazilian selective-fire or semi-automatic assault rifle

Assault rifle

An assault rifle is a selective fire rifle that uses an intermediate cartridge and a detachable magazine. Assault rifles are the standard infantry weapons in most modern armies...

 that has been produced by IMBEL

IMBEL

IMBEL is an acronym for Indústria de Material Bélico do Brasil a Brazilian state company, founded in 1975 as a quango of the Ministry of Defence....

 in Brazil since 1997. It is based upon the IMBEL MD2

IMBEL MD2

The IMBEL MD series of assault rifles are the standard-issue rifles of the Brazilian Army.-History:...

, which is itself based upon the FN FAL

FN FAL

The Fusil Automatique Léger or FAL is a self-loading, selective fire battle rifle produced by the Belgian armaments manufacturer Fabrique Nationale de Herstal . During the Cold War it was adopted by many North Atlantic Treaty Organization countries, with the notable exception of the United States...

.

Variants

MD97L- standard full-size, selective-fire version for use with Brazilian Army.

MD97LM- MD97L with the addition of MIL-STD-1913 rails for mounting scopes and tactical attachments intended for use by Brazilian Special forces.

MD97LC- compact, semi-automatic only version for use with domestic police forces.