Turkish officials will visit Washington DC to discuss the purchase of the latest Lockheed Martin F-16 fighter jets and upgrade kits.
The visit will take place in mid-August 2022. According to Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar, the Turkish delegation was invited by US officials.
In a televised statement, Akar said Turkey is concerned about the conditions imposed on the deal by some US senators, and wishes for those conditions to be removed, according to local press reports.
The conditions Akar mentioned would, among other things, prohibit the Turkish Air Force from using the jets for unauthorized overflights of Greece. They have been put forward by US lawmakers following US President Joe Biden’s June 2022 pledge to finally deliver new F-16s to Turkey.
“We cannot accept these conditions. Our wish is that the Senate removes them,” Akar said, according to the Daily Sabah.
Turkey has been mulling the purchase of the latest variant of the F-16 and upgrade kits for its older variants since the country were dropped from the F-35 development program in 2019.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the US was the first to propose the sale of the F-16 to Turkey, although there has been no official confirmation of such an arrangement.