Turkish defense industry: delivery of Turkish drones to Ukraine has nothing to do with Russia

Turkey has been delivering Turkish Bayraktar drones to Ukraine as scheduled according to the requirements of the deal and new delivery has nothing to do with the objection of Russia, the country’s top defense official İsmail Demir said.

“We sold a lot of [armed unmanned aerial vehicles] UAVs to Ukraine. Now, there is no such thing as selling while there is tension with Russia. It was a process. There were batch agreements that were discussed from the beginning,” İsmail Demir, the head of Turkey’s Defense Industries Presidency, told a group of journalists.

He was asked about media reports in Ukraine that Kiev will buy another batch of Turkish drones for its armed forces next year amid Russia’s increasing unease towards Ankara due to the arms deal.

“Ukraine had certain production and investment projects. As a requirement of previous agreements, this is the progress of the project that has been talked about from the beginning. It has nothing to do with the latest developments,” Milliyet cited Demir as saying.

One should not have the understanding that Turkey is sending UAVs to Ukraine due to the tension, he emphasized.