Lithuania is considering buying IRIS-T medium-range air defence system from Germany, Defence Minister Laurynas Kasčiūnas has said.
He made the announcement on Tuesday in Palanga after a meeting with German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius.
“I can say today a very important thing, from my point of view, that we are considering the acquisition of the IRIS-T medium-range air defence system from Germany,” Kasčiūnas told journalists.
“A system, which has proven itself and is effective in Ukraine, could become part of our armed forces in a few years,” he added.
Meanwhile, Pistorius said that Berlin does not have air defence systems that could be sold immediately.
“We do not have the IRIS-T system yet, we gave it up ourselves for Ukraine, and we are now negotiating with our military industry to increase its production capacity,” the German defence minister said.
According to Kasčiūnas, the German defence industry is growing and producing weapons that are efficient.
“We base our planning on this. Naturally, we are interested in the IRIS-T system, which proved its worth in Ukraine. We understand that it is not so easy now and there are production processes, capacities, but we are very clear in saying that this is a product that is of great interest to us,” he said.
In September last year, it was reported that Estonia and Latvia signed a joint agreement to buy IRIS-T systems from German manufacturer Diehl for around 1 billion euros.
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