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Ukrainian government recently approved a bilateral agreement on the construction of the Bayraktar drone factory in Ukraine and sent it to parliament for ratification. Vasyl Bodnar, Ambassador of Ukraine to the Republic of Turkey, spoke about this in an interview for RBC-Ukraine.
According to the ambassador, the owner of the company has already acquired a land plot in Ukraine, developed the project of the plant itself and is ready to implement the project.
“And it (the obligation to start building a plant in Ukraine – ed.) is not only political, but also practical issue, since a significant part of the models that will be produced at this plant will have Ukrainian-made components,” Bodnar added.
As the ambassador noted, engines, wheels, or other spare parts of Ukrainian production can be used during the construction of aircraft.
“Despite the war, our companies continue to fulfill their obligations. Perhaps not in such volumes as planned, but they do not leave this work, and this also shows how responsible a partner we are, who does not leave the Turkish side alone with its problems first of all, in the supply of those things that are needed for their defense,” Bodnar said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, at a meeting with Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, also proposed to establish the production of Bayraktar attack drones in Russia.
As reported earlier, Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov revealed that Ukraine has received 50 armed drones from Turkish arms company Baykar since Russia’s 24 February invasion.
“Thanks to the powerful cooperation of the presidents of Ukraine, Vladimir Zelensky, and Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, our military received the first Bayraktar on the battlefield back in 2021, “ Renizkov said. “They have shown themselves very successfully in the battle.”
Ukraine and Turkey have close defence industry cooperation, a relationship that has flourished in recent years.
Ukrainian companies also produce the Baykar’s engines, and Turkey was known to have sold more than 20 Bayraktars to Kyiv over the course of the past two years. Reznikov’s information significantly increased that number.
