Defense fair opens with focus on permanent regional peace
Posted by meb at April 28th, 2009
The International Defence Industry Fair (IDEF’09) opened yesterday at the TÜYAP Fair, Convention and Congress Center in İstanbul’s Büyükçekmece district.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Chief of General Staff Gen. İlker Başbuğ, State Minister Egemen Bağış, Defense Minister Vecdi Gönül, military commanders and foreign guests participated in the opening ceremony. Turkey is expected to sign agreements with Germany, Australia and Syria for cooperation in the defense industry. Businessmen from 80 countries and more than 400 senior officials, including 25 ministers, are participating in IDEF’09, and some 62 percent of the firms exhibiting at the fair are foreign companies. Speaking at the opening ceremony, Erdoğan said Turkey had always placed a priority on efforts to maintain peace in its region and the world. “Ensuring peace and stability in the challenging geography where we are situated will undoubtedly contribute to global peace and security,” the prime minister said.
Erdoğan noted that as a member of NATO for the past 57 years, Turkey had been a stabilizing element in its region and had made significant contributions to peace and welfare throughout the world. The Turkish prime minister said Turkey had undertaken significant responsibilities in preventing threats to regional peace and had assumed a leading role in efforts to overcome security problems in the Caucasus; maintain communication between Pakistan and Afghanistan; solve the Palestinian-Israeli dispute; and ensure stability in Lebanon. Underlining the strategic importance of Turkey’s defense forces, the prime minister said Turkey had offered its military capabilities toward the preservation of regional peace, stability and security.
Also speaking at the inauguration, Defense Minister Gönül said Turkey aimed to improve its defense industry with mutual cooperation with its friends and allies. “We believe that Turkey can contribute much to global peace should it use its local resources and potential effectively,” the minister noted. He said the fair’s scope had been expanded this year to include naval defense technologies. Underlining that supplied with a wide range of the latest technology, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) is one of the most highly developed militaries in the world, Gönül said Turkey had increasingly concentrated on defense industry research and development (R&D) in the past few years. Organized by the Turkish Armed Forces Foundation (TSKGV) under the auspices of the Defense Ministry, the fair will run until April 30. IDEF was first held in Ankara in 1993.
source. Today’s Zaman
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