ANKARA, September 25. /TASS/. Supplies of S-400 systems to Turkey will begin within two years, Turkey’s Undersecretary for Defense Industries Ismail Demir said on Monday.

"I’d refrain from giving a concrete date because talks are underway. But I can tell that S-400 supplies will begin within at least two years," A Haber television channel quoted him as saying.

On September 12, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Ankara had signed an agreement with Moscow to purchase S-400 systems and had already made an advance payment. Russian president’s aide for issues of military technical cooperation, Vladimir Kozhin, told TASS such a contract had been signed and was about to be implemented.

According to media reports, Erdogan is expected to raise the topic of S-400 supplies at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Ankara on September 28.

Russia’s S-400 Triumf (NATO reporting name: SA-21 Growler) is the latest long-range anti-aircraft missile system that went into service in 2007. It is designed to destroy aircraft, cruise and ballistic missiles, including medium-range missiles, and surface targets. The S-400 can engage targets at a distance of 400 kilometers and at an altitude of up to 30 kilometers. Deputy Commander of Russia’s Aerospace Force Viktor Gumenny said last April that S-400 capable of destroying targets in near space had begun to enter duty.