Türkiye and Britain on Monday signed a multibillion-dollar agreement for Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jets and Ankara said it was also seeking more warplanes from Gulf states.
The deal deepens the NATO allies' ties and bolsters the defense air defenses of Türkiye, which is seeking to leverage the advanced jets to make up ground with regional rivals such as Israel, which has unleashed strikes across the Middle East this year.
Europe, meanwhile, has increasingly turned to Türkiye, NATO's second-largest military and a major exporter of armed drones, to reinforce its eastern flank and potentially backstop any future post-war stabilization force in Ukraine.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan hailed the Eurofighter deal, signed in Ankara during British Prime Minister Keir Starmer's first visit to the country, as "a new symbol of the strategic relationship between us as two close allies."
He thanked the other members of the four-nation consortium that builds the jets: Germany, Italy and Spain. The consortium is represented by BAE Systems, Airbus and Leonardo. Erdoğan is due to host German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Thursday.
Starmer called the deal a "landmark moment" and described it as "a win for British workers, a win for our defense industry, and a win for NATO security."
What does deal cover?
The agreement is worth 8 billion pounds ($10.7 billion) and covers 20 Eurofighter jets that Türkiye will buy from the United Kingdom.
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