Starmer’s announcement on visit to Ankara comes as jailed opposition leader Ekrem İmamoğlu faces fresh charges
Starmer’s announcement on visit to Ankara comes as jailed opposition leader Ekrem İmamoğlu faces fresh charges
Britain has agreed to sell 20 Typhoon fighter jets to Turkey in an £8bn deal despite concerns about alleged human rights violations by its government.
Keir Starmer signed the deal during a visit on Monday to Ankara to meet the country’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The prime minister said the deal would boost the Nato alliance, despite criticism of Turkey’s increasingly authoritarian administration.
The deal was signed as Erdoğan’s jailed chief political opponent, Ekrem İmamoğlu, faced fresh charges including alleged links to British intelligence.
The jet, also known as the Eurofighter, is a joint project between the UK, Germany, Italy and Spain, and has been one of the Royal Air Force’s key aircraft for two decades, including in Iraq, and intercepting Russian planes since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The order comes after the managing director of the Typhoon programme, Richard Hamilton, told reporters in July that he was “really confident” of receiving export orders to preserve the Warton production line in Lancashire.
Starmer described the deal as a landmark agreement and “a win for British workers, a win for our defence industry, and a win for Nato security”.
BAE Systems will assemble Turkey’s jets in the UK and the first delivery is expected in 2030. The order will secure the jobs of about 500 workers at the company’s Warton site and benefit a facility making front fuselages at Samlesbury, 12 miles (20km) to the east.
