Earlier this week (September 21, 2020) Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron spoke by phone about regional developments, mainly in Turkey-France and the Eastern Mediterranean.

In a telephone conversation, according to foreign media reports, President Erdogan asked France to ren out of its opposition stance in the Eurosam SAMP-T agreement.

In 2018, a joint French-Italian consortium, Eurosam, signed a cooperation agreement to work on the development and production of the long-range air and missile defence system. In the mid-2020s, it was announced that the system would be produced and improved.

In June 2020, President of Defence Industries İsmail Demir said, “Part of the reason why there is no concrete development about SAMP-T despite the execution of the identification study is France’s political attitude towards Turkey. There is a possibility that the project will continue with Italian partners, but the process may be blocked.”

President Macron said Ankara should clarify its objectives in Syria before deployed European-made systems to Turkey.