President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan visited the construction site of the Akkuyu nuclear power plant in the country's southern Mersin province, after attending the launch ceremony of the Abdülhamid Han ultra-deepwater drillship.

Erdoğan made investigations and received information from authorities during the visit that was closed to the media.

Akkuyu has set an operational date for the first reactor by 2023, with the entire plant expected to be up and running by 2025. The project began with a 2010 intergovernmental agreement between Türkiye and Russia.

At a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, last week in Sochi, Erdoğan stressed the importance of the project and ruled out any postponement.

He denied rumors that the project has been delayed.

"There are claims such as '25,000 people are not working right now or this place has been closed,'" he said. "I do not accept such a thing and neither does the Russian side. They are working."

Erdoğan added that he will inform Putin about the progress after the inspection.