Bayraktar TB2

Some 39 Turkish defense companies are attending the Doha International Maritime Defense Exhibition and Conference (DIMDEX) this year, the Presidency of Defense Industries (SSB) has said.

Search teams have detected the locations of the nine missing workers who got trapped in the landslide-hit gold mine in the eastern province of Erzincan, with six of them believed to be at a spot different from the remaining three, the energy minister has informed.

Turkish company Baykar has started building a drone factory near the Ukrainian capital of Kiev, says its CEO Haluk Bayraktar.

Baykar's TB2 or TB3 drone models will be produced at the plant, which will create jobs for 500 people, Bayraktar said, speaking at the World World Defense Show in Saudi Arabia's Riyadh.

Turkish defense company Baykar has started building a factory near Kyiv that will employ around 500 people and where it will manufacture either its TB2 or TB3 drone models, the company's chief executive told Reuters.

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 said on Dec. 4.

Turkey's foreign minister responded on Oct. 30 to accusations against the country about Ukraine's use of drones in the conflict-ridden eastern Donbas region.

Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said drones used by Ukraine may have been produced in Turkey but are used by Ukraine, thus Turkey cannot be blamed.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces shared footage on social media on Oct. 26 of its first ever combat deployment of a Turkish Bayraktar TB2 armed drone to destroy a howitzer used by pro-Russian separatists in Donbas. 

The Bayraktar TB2 was used for the first time to force the separatists to abide by a cease-fire, the armed forces said in a Facebook statement.

Kyrgyzstan's president said on Oct. 23 that his country will purchase unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) from both Turkey and Russia.

"We're not buying drones to go to war with someone. We will buy drones to ensure the country's security," Sadyr Japarov said in his first annual press conference in the capital Bishkek, after assuming the post at the beginning of 2021.

The Turkish arms industry is booming, and the country's drones are a real export hit. President Erdogan is proud of the development in the industry, and the army regularly tests new weapons abroad, Deutsche Welle reports.

Teknofest, Turkey's largest aerospace and technology gathering and the world's second-biggest aviation event, kicked off on Sept. 21 in Istanbul.

The five-day festival, jointly organized by the Turkish Technology Team Foundation (T3) and the Industry and Technology Ministry, is going to last until Sept. 26 in Istanbul's Atatürk Airport.