A collaboration between Italy, Britain and Japan to build a next-generation fighter jet is likely to be extended to Saudi Arabia.

Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said this.

The three countries agreed in December 2022 on the Global Combat Air Program (Gcap), the first major collaboration between several countries in the defense sector.

"The agreement we have with Britain and Japan I think will now be extended to Saudi Arabia," Tajani said.

This month the three countries said they were negotiating for an expansion of the project after a meeting in Brazil between Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Japanese and British Prime Ministers Shigeru Ishiba and Keir Starmer.

The partners aim to see the combat aircraft in the air by the middle of the next decade. Leonardo, Bae Systems and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries are participating in the project.

Earlier, Reuters wrote that Saudi Arabia was among the candidate countries to become a junior partner in the Gcap, bringing its financial strength and a lucrative market to a project expected to cost tens of billions of dollars.

(Angelo Amante, translated by Laura Contemori, editing Claudia Cristoferi)