Dendias: Great development in our defense industry – we will not look to the Turks to produce drones

In the near future, a piece of legislation is coming, which has a huge ambition “to create an ecosystem of innovation and strengthening of the Greek defense industry”. This was emphasized by the Minister of National Defense Nikos Dendias, in an interview he gave to Real FM and the journalist Nikos Hatzinikolaou.

“Following”, he added, “examples that exist, Israel is the best known of them, but not the only one, one can see the Emirates, to go to the Arab world as well, one can see Britain, one can see the France”.

“We are working with all these countries on this. All this will hopefully ensure an ecosystem, which will allow the Greek defense industry and Greek businesses, but also the Greek researchers – and I include the students of the higher schools of the Armed Forces who are interested in this – to create a completely new reality ” explained.

“The country cannot be only a buyer and consumer of weapon systems from abroad. There must be Greek surplus value and Greek production. It is not possible, to put it simply, for Turkey to produce drones and for Greece to look at them, this is not possible,” he pointed out.

Referring to the steps taken to strengthen the Armed Forces, he said: “The top two known to the Greek citizen are the 3 Belharra, I received one a few days ago. The two squadrons of Rafale, 18 of them are already in Greece and the maintenance of the Mirage 2000-5, the upgrade of the F-16. So, in the big projects we have done quite well.”

“But what is missing and should we hunt for it? The projects with perhaps the smallest presence, but very important for the Armed Forces, such as maintenance, modernization of ships, maintenance of Armed Forces vehicles, Air Force transports, helicopters” he continued.

Regarding Greek-Turkish relations, he said: “The permanent Greek interest is for Turkey to be a country included in the Western camp and a country that approaches not only the European Union as an organization, but also the values ​​and principles of the European and Western edifice.” .

“Greece,” he added, “always asks everyone to respect international law and humanitarian law. This applies to our friends and anyone and the state of Israel. We do not justify retaliation or anything that constitutes an act of violence against civilians.”

“Direct participation of Greece in military operations neither exists nor can exist. Greece has no intention of becoming part of a military conflict,” he clarified.