Norway to buy four ThyssenKrupp subs in 4.3 billion euro deal

ECKERNFOERDE, Germany (Reuters) - Norway plans to sign a deal to buy four submarines from ThyssenKrupp in 2019, Norwegian defence minister Marie Eriksen Soreide said on Tuesday during a visit with her German counterpart to a German marine base.

German media has reported the four submarines will cost 4.3 billion euros ($5.06 billion).

The purchase of the ships is part of a cooperation agreement between the two countries, under which Germany's armed forces will buy two identical submarines from Germany's ThyssenKrupp and missiles from Norway's Kongsberg.

"We want to sign the deal in 2019 and get the first submarines in the mid-2020s," Eriksen Soreide said.

 

($1 = 0.8498 euros)

(Reporting By Sabine Siebold; Writing by Thomas Escritt; Editing by Edmund Blair)