Kyrgyzstan Taalaibek Omuraliev Ministry of Defense met with Turkish Ambassador Kamil Firat. In addition to talking face to face, they took part in the ceremony of transferring ammunition and equipment from Ankara to the Kyrgyz military.
According to official reports, this time, sets of clothing (shoes and other equipment), mountain equipment, and cars were transferred. The last time Turkey supplied the Kyrgyz army was in September this year. Then it was about weapons and military equipment, but the specifics were not announced.
The weapons, military equipment used today by the Armed Forces of Kyrgyzstan were mainly inherited from the Soviet Union, but there is a part that has already been delivered from post-Soviet Russia. Also in service are NATO-made samples, including American mortars delivered from Turkey in different years, and landing gear and communications equipment.
At the end of the ceremony of handing over to the Kyrgyz army a batch of military property from Turkey, Taalaibek Omuraliev and Kamil Firat told the press that they intend to continue to cooperate in the defense sphere.
It is noteworthy that the transfer of equipment and vehicles coincided with the first ever visit of the Minister of National Defense of Turkey Hulusi Akar to neighboring Kazakhstan. One of the issues that he discussed with his Kazakh counterpart Nurlan Yermekbaev and the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Askar Mamin was the creation of the so-called “Turanian army”. This idea, actively promoted by Ankara, provides for the creation of a military-political union of the Turkic-speaking countries. The armed forces of the countries of the Turkic Council are considered by Ankara as components of the future “Turkic army”. It should be noted that Turkey already has some experience in uniting security officials from Turkic-speaking countries. In 2013, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan and Mongolia merged into the “Association of Military Law Enforcement Agencies”.
The participation of Azerbaijan in the creation of the “Turanian Army” seems to have been predetermined. Joining this idea of Uzbekistan is questionable. But in this case, the position of Kyrgyzstan and especially Kazakhstan, which are members of the CSTO, is important. If they support the idea of creating a “Turanian army”, it will deal a serious blow to the “Tashkent Pact”. This is also sometimes called the Collective Security Treaty Organization. It was established on May 15, 1992 in the Uzbek capital. Initially, it also included Uzbekistan, which Ankara is also counting on in creating the “Turan Army”. A year later, Azerbaijan joined the CSTO. But in 1999 Tashkent, Baku and Tbilisi refused to renew their membership in the Organization. They, as well as Moldova and Ukraine, created GUUAM, a regional union that bore a clear anti-Russian coloration. True, after a short time, Uzbekistan left this organization, which has since been called GUAM.
The idea of creating the “Turanian army” is a military continuation of the Turkic Council or the Cooperation Council of Turkic-speaking states concluded on October 3, 2009 in Nakhichevan (the administrative center of the Nakhichevan autonomy of Azerbaijan). It includes five states: Turkey, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.
Attempts are being made to draw Turkmenistan into the Turkic Council, but the latter values its neutrality, therefore it ignores all attempts to draw it into any supranational political, and even more so military structures.
