Turkey and the United States are in talks over the procurement of the Patriot missile system. However, Ankara and Washington have not yet negotiated the purchase of the US Patriot missile systems by Turkey, Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdağ said on Monday.
"US President Donald Trump proposed to our President [Recep] Tayyip Erdoğan to supply Patriot systems, and our president said that Turkey could purchase these systems. After that, no negotiations were held on this issue. Our Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu was expected to hold a meeting with [US State Secretary Rex] Tillerson on March 19 and this issue was supposed to be on the agenda. However, the meeting did not take place due to Tillerson's resignation. A Turkish deputy foreign minister will travel to the United States in the coming days," Bozdağ told reporters.
The news comes after the head of the Turkish Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Commission, Volkan Bozkır, said that the United States was “not positive” about selling F-35 jets to Turkey if it buys S-400 missile systems from Russia. Moreover, on March 17, a group of US lawmakers, led by Senator Bob Menendez, told the State Department that any sale of Russian S-400 air defense systems — including to Turkey — should lead to punitive measures under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA).
The S-400 systems that Ankara buys from Russia are "independent" systems, and the Turkish government is still interested in "NATO-compatible systems," Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said on March 23.
"Our work on Patriot missiles and other systems compatible with NATO will continue," Yıldırım told reporters. "The US is still our ally despite its mistakes in the region of Syria," he said.
According to reports a senior US official is expected to pay a visit to Ankara on March 31 to discuss the issue.
MINISTER DENIES POSSIBLE IMPACT OF S-400 PURCHASE ON F-35 JETS DEALS
Ankara's purchase of Russia's S-400 air defense systems will have no impact on the deliveries of US F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli told Sputnik on Tuesday.
"There are no problems, this will not affect the purchase of F-35 [jets]. There are also no problems with the purchase of S-400, moreover, the systems may be delivered ahead of schedule," Canikli said.
In December, Russia and Turkey signed a loan agreement on the purchase of Russian-made S-400 air defense missile systems. Under the deal, Russia will supply Turkey with four batteries of S-400s. On March 14, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Moscow reacted positively to Ankara's request to speed up the delivery process. On March 12, Russian Presidential Aide for Defense Industry Cooperation Vladimir Kozhin said that Russia would start supplying S-400s to Turkey in late 2019 or early 2020.
The deal prompted concerns in NATO, with its Deputy Secretary General Rose Gottemoeller saying earlier in March that the S-400 does not integrate with NATO members' systems.
