Trainers from Iran would help the Russian army with drones
American officials confided on condition of anonymity to the New York Times that Iran had sent trainers to Crimea – occupied by Russia – to train Russian troops to fly drones bought by Moscow from Tehran.
The trainers are said to be from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a branch of the Iranian military designated as a terrorist organization by Washington. And according to the American daily, this Iranian personnel would not be near the front lines.
Kyiv’s military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov revealed on Tuesday that Iran had supplied Russia with an initial batch of 1,750 Shahed drones, and that Moscow had placed further orders. Over the past 10 days, more than 100 Iranian-made self-destructing drones have struck power plants, sewage treatment plants, residential buildings, bridges and other targets in urban areas, the Ukrainian foreign ministry has listed. .
“We have no such information”replied Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, when asked by a journalist about the use of Iranian drones by Moscow in Ukraine. “Russian technology is used, with Russian names”.
Tehran has repeated that it does not have “exported arms to none of the warring parties”while Washington has threatened to sanction companies or states collaborating in the Iranian drone program.
For its part, NATO is preparing to deliver hundreds of signal jammers to Ukraine to help counter the threat posed by these drones. Speaking remotely at a conference in Berlin, Alliance Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the systems “will help them deal with this specific drone threat, including, of course, Iranian-made drones, which are now causing a lot of havoc and suffering”.