Turkey to sign missile agreement with China in late 2013

An agreement on building long-range missiles will be signed with China in late 2013, the Turkish Defense Industry Committee said today. The Chinese company's project which envisages manufacturing FD-2000 missiles technically leaves the Russian, American and French-Italian companies projects behind. Earlier it was reported that on September 2013 at a meeting of the Turkish Defence Industry Executive Committee it was announced that the Chinese CPMIEC company won the tender for the creation of long range missiles in Turkey. It was also reported that these missiles will be created by the Chinese company in cooperation with Turkish companies. Moreover, it is reported that the U.S. authorities informed Turkey of their concerns about the country's intentions to cooperate with China in the creation of missile defence systems. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said the priority for Turkey is to create the missiles in his own country.