Turkey has rejected a proposal by the United States which suggested that Ankara send the S-400 air defense systems it had purchased from Russia to Kiev. To affirm it is Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu quoted by the Turkish agency ‘Anadolu’.
“The United States asked us to send the S-400s to Ukraine, and we said no”, said the minister, explaining that this proposal is “unacceptable as it harms Turkish sovereignty”.
The United States in recent years has excluded Turkey from the F35 program after the acquisition of the Russian air defense system. Turkish officials have repeatedly said that Turkey bought the S-400s as a matter of national security and no other country has the right to interfere with this. According to ‘Anadolu’ when Turkey failed in its protracted efforts to buy a defense system from the United States in 2017, Ankara decided to sign a contract with Russia. US officials have expressed opposition to their deployment, arguing that the S-400 would be incompatible with NATO systems.
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