Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan paid an official visit to Ukraine on 3 February. As part of the visit, he is scheduled to sign an agreement on a free trade zone between the countries.
At around 1 p.m., Erdogan arrived at the Mariinskyy Palace, where he is meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
This will be followed by the tenth meeting of the high-level Strategic Council between Ukraine and Turkey, chaired by Zelensky and Erdogan.
In the morning, Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov gave a media briefing in which he revealed details of one of the agreements that will be signed with Turkey today. We are talking about the construction of a factory in Ukraine to produce Bayraktar drones. There are also plans to create a training center for pilots who will fly drones.
Before his visit to Ukraine, Erdogan made statements about the upcoming meetings. He said today is the 30th anniversary of Turkey's diplomatic relations with Ukraine and the visit has special significance.
"We will further strengthen the treaty basis of our relations by signing agreements in various fields," he said.
He said serious progress has been made in relations with Ukraine, especially in areas such as trade, investment, tourism and the defense industry.
"Despite the epidemic, last year we welcomed more than 2 million Ukrainian friends to Turkey, the volume of bilateral trade increased by about 60% compared to 2020 and reached $7.5 billion. We are taking firm steps to reach our goal of $10 billion. I believe that the free trade agreement that we will sign on the occasion of my visit will allow us to achieve this goal in a short time," he said.
