Keel Laid for PN MİLGEM 4th Ship
Affiliate of the National Defense Ministry, ASFAT laid the keel for the 4th PN MİLGEM Ship to be delivered to the Pakistani Naval Forces as part of the Turkish defense industry’s largest export project (in a single lot) PN MİLGEM, at the Karachi Shipyard as of November 5, 2021. Pakistani Naval Forces Commander Full Admiral Amjad Khan NİAZİ and ASFAT General Manager Esad AKGÜN attended the keel-laying ceremony of the 4th PN MİLGEM.
ASFAT General Manager Esad AKGÜN touched upon the cooperation between Turkey and Pakistan. In his speech, Esad AKGÜN noted that they completed the thousandth day of the PN MİLGEM and added that the cooperation between Pakistan and Turkey expanded further with the Jinnah Project. The Jinnah Project has been underway for two years and the design stage has been completed. AKGÜN continued, “The Jinnah Class Frigate to be built in Karachi, Pakistan, will be a larger and an equipped vessel that will display our culture of collaboration.” Speaking at the ceremony, Pakistani Naval Forces Commander Full Admiral Amjad Khan NİAZİ emphasized Turkey and Pakistan’s cooperation. Stressing that he fully agreed with Esad AKGÜN’s comments on the relationships between the two countries, NİAZİ said, “I believe that the two countries’ relationship will develop further in the upcoming days.”
The project contains the construction of a total of four corvettes for the Pakistani Naval Forces. The design of these corvettes is to be shaped over the ADA Class Corvette’s design. Two ships will be built at İstanbul Shipyard and the other two will be built at a shipyard in Karachi, Pakistan. The first corvette of the project, PN BABUR-280 was launched on August 15th and the equipping activities were initiated. All the vessels included in the Project are planned to be delivered to Pakistani Naval Forces by 2025. In the meantime, the newly designed vessels to be built as a sequel to the PN-MİLGEM Project are named JİNNAH Class Frigates. The scaled design model of the vessel was displayed at ASFAT’s booth at the IDEF’21 Fair.
