Turkey has chosen Chinese defence firm CPMIEC to co-produce a $4 bn long-range air and missile defense system, rejecting rival bids from Russian, US and European firms.
The Turkish defence minister announced the decision in a statement on Thursday.
Turkey, which is a member of the NATO military alliance, has no long-range missile defense system of its own, but NATO has deployed the US-built Patriot air and missile defense system there since 2012.
The winning Chinese FD-2000 system beat out the US Patriot, Russian S-400, and French-Italian Eurosam Samp-T to win the contract.
Turkey has “decided to begin talks with the CPMIEC company of the People’s Republic of China for the joint production of the systems and its missiles in Turkey,” said an official statement, AlJazeera informs.
