Turkey-Azerbaijan mulls cooperation in defense industry

Among the new cooperation projects in the field of the defense industry between Turkey and Azerbaijan are unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UAVs), which have proven their capabilities after being used in several recent regional conflicts such as the Nagorno-Karabakh war. One of the potential areas is the possibility of joint production of the world-famous armed drones in Azerbaijan, according to Turkey's Defense Industries Chief İsmail Demir.

The issue was expressed first when President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on June 15 visited Shusha, a city liberated by the Azeri army during the six-week armed conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in late 2020. One of the corporation areas mentioned in the Shusha Declaration signed by Erdoğan and Azerbaijani President İlham Aliyev was the subject of the defense industry and military cooperation. Erdoğan announced that a factory would be established to share technology with Azerbaijan and to produce products jointly in this country.

Speaking to Hürriyet Daily News on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, Demir said Ankara and Baku are working on several projects to expand bilateral cooperation on the defense industry and establishing a factory for the production of armed drones in Azerbaijan.

He emphasized that the basic approach in this cooperation model is to complement the deficiencies of the two countries in the defense industry.

Recalling the long-standing motto of Turkey and Azerbaijan, "one nation, two states," he said: "We think we should also act that way."

They don't want the duplication of abilities in the defense industry but aim all kinds of investments and abilities in this field to complement each other's deficiencies, Demir emphasized.

"Let's take the example of the...