In yet another move that will further strengthen the normalization of relations with Egypt following a decade of rupture, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has said Turkey agreed to sell its popular drones to the country.
“Normalization in our relations is important so as to allow Egypt to have certain technologies. We have an agreement to provide [Egypt] unmanned air vehicles and other technologies,” Fidan told pro-government A Haber station on Sunday. He did not provide any details about the agreement.
Fidan’s remarks came shortly before a visit President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is expected to pay to Egypt on February 14. It will be Erdoğan’s first visit to the country since 2011, when Erdoğan was prime minister.
Relations were severed a decade ago when Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, then Egypt’s defense minister, ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, an ally of Turkey and part of the Muslim Brotherhood movement.
At the time Erdoğan said he would never speak to “anyone” like Sisi, who in 2014 became president of the Arab world’s most populous nation.
The first signs of a thaw came in May 2021, when a Turkish delegation visited Egypt to discuss possible normalization.
In November 2022 Erdoğan and Sisi shook hands in Qatar in what the Egyptian presidency heralded as a new beginning in their relations.
The two leaders then spoke by telephone after two devastating earthquakes hit Turkey in February 2023.
The normalization in relations was crowned by the two countries’ reciprocal appointment of ambassadors in July.
Erdoğan, one of the leading promotors of Turkey’s drone technology abroad, is a main contributor to the export of drones developed by Baykar to more than 30 countries.
Erdoğan’s son-in-law Selçuk Bayraktar is the company’s chairman.
Drones developed by Baykar have gained more popularity particularly after they were used in conflicts in Azerbaijan and Libya in addition to Ukraine.
Baykar signed agreements worth millions of dollars in countries recently visited by Erdoğan.
In July Baykar signed an export and cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Defense for the Bayraktar Akıncı unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV). The deal was the largest defense and aviation export contract in Turkey’s history. The agreement was made during a visit by Erdoğan to Saudi Arabia. No details were given about the value of the deal, but there were reports that it was worth $3.1 billion.
