16:39 20/12/2022
The Albanian government signed today the agreement for the purchase of “Bayraktar” unmanned combat drones. Minister of Defense Niko Peleshi, present at this event, expressed his enthusiasm for cooperation with the Republic of Turkey and clarified the importance of this for our country.
Niko Peleshi: What we are writing and celebrating today is also a product of this spirit, of this strategic partnership that we have with the Republic of Turkey, and also through the state-by-state agreement procedure that we have managed to reach the final day of finalizing the purchase of the three systems which are an innovation for our air force, the well-known “Bayraktar” drones, as we know them in everyday language, but are technically known as unmanned aerial vehicles. Mr. Bayraktar, it is a very special feeling for me as the Minister of Defense to realize the signing of an important agreement with the well-known Turkish company “Bayraktar” for the purchase of unmanned combat aircraft, an important step in the interest of the modernization of Albanian FA. I am sure that the use of these assets in our country will increase the capacities of the FA and Civil Emergency structures in terms of controlling the territory and preventing illegal events.
The minister added that the modernization of the Armed Forces is under constant attention of the Albanian government. The agreement provides for the initial purchase of three drones and the fleet is expected to expand in the coming years.
Niko Peleshi: 2023 will be the year we start building the fleet, we’ll start with a small number and then we’ll grow it over the coming years, but it’s the year we’ll hopefully have the new capabilities of these vehicles, fighter jets no pilots we are signing even today. We will start with a small fleet of three of them and will likely grow in the future.
The drones will serve to monitor the country while there will be an integration of information with the satellite service that will start soon. Peleshi said that there will also be a major center of communication technology for the modernization of the Armed Forces.
Niko Peleshi: We have already established the structures with other institutions that are ready to use the images and information that will be produced either by the satellite service that will soon be launched in our country, but also through the images and information received by unmanned combat aircraft. which we will have as such.
We had a very productive discussion today with Mr. Bayraktar, not only regarding this particular event and the agreement that is being signed today, but also other support that the company can offer us in terms of innovation, maintenance, as well as projects that can go beyond our national borders, they can serve other countries too, why not. Maybe in the future we can also transfer some of Bayraktar’s technologies here so that we can do the assembly or part of the segment quickly in Albania because very soon we will have a major, very large technology center information and communication that will modernize the FA with new capacities and opportunities, but on the other hand we will educate new technologies, new skills our children and young people and maybe the Republic of Turkey which has a lot of experience and the company “Bayraktar”, through this cooperation that we are starting today, we can be one of the actors of this innovation system that we are planning to build here in Tirana, in Albania, which is conceived to be not only national, but also regional.
The firm ‘Bayraktar Technology’ specializes in the design of transformative technologies in the field of defense and aviation. The equipment with these planes will offer other institutions of the Albanian government a great support at the operational level, in various fields.broread