Local company provides helmets to Zelensky, his team

GAZİANTEP

A Turkish company has provided ballistic protective helmets and flak jackets to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his team.

In the early days of the war between Russia and Ukraine, they received a demand requesting special helmets and protective vests, said Vedat Tüzer, the executive of Garanti Kompozit, a company specialized in the production of ballistic protective body armors in the Central Anatolian province of Yozgat.

“Upon request, we delivered 20 such helmets and vests to be used by Zelensky and his team. We later saw them on TV wearing our products. That made us proud,” Tüzer said.

Meanwhile, Industry and Technology Minister Mustafa Varank paid a visit to Garanti Giyim Kompozit Teknolojileri’s factory in the Yozgat Organized Industrial Zone.

Company officials briefed Varank about their operations.

“Production of such defense equipment and their exports to other countries show the progress Turkey has made in this field,” Varank said.

The company plans to invest in high technology, and the ministry will support their initiative, Varank added.

For his part, Tüzer said Garanti Kompozit exports its products to more than 50 countries.

“Since 2013, we have also been providing some 80 percent ballistic of helmets in Turkey. Up until then, those helmets, which would be sold at $1,900, had been bought from foreign companies. Those purchases from foreign firms came to a halt after we stepped in,” Tüzer said.