Ukrainian military claims downing Iran drone used by Russia
The Hindu
Iran has drawn closer to Russia as it faces crushing sanctions over the collapse of the nuclear deal in 2018 after then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from the accord
Ukraine's military claimed on September 13 for the first time that it encountered an Iranian-supplied suicide drone used by Russia on the battlefield, showing the deepening ties between Moscow and Tehran as the Islamic Republic's tattered nuclear deal with world powers hangs in the balance.
U.S. intelligence publicly warned back in July that Tehran planned to send hundreds of bomb-carrying drones to Russia to aid its war on Ukraine. While Iran initially denied it, the head of its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has recently boasted about arming the world's top powers.
The Ukrainian military's Strategic Communications Directorate published images of the wreckage of the drone. It resembled a triangle, or delta-shaped, drone flown by Iran known as the Shahed, or “Witness” in Farsi.
The military official and the website both said Ukrainian troops encountered the drone near Kupiansk amid Kyiv's offensive that has punched through Russian lines around Kharkiv on the eastern front.
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The image suggested the Shahed drone had been shot down by Ukrainian forces and hadn't detonated on impact as designed, though little other information was immediately released by Kyiv. An inscription on the drone identified it as an "M214 Gran-2," which didn't immediately correspond to known Russian weaponry.
Iran's mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.