Podolyak said the Iranian side’s admission to transfer an allegedly small number of drones to Russia prior to a full-scale invasion seems “a bit strange”.
“That is, they delivered more than 1,000 pre-war drones, which they began to use only after Russia practically lost the war on the battlefield. That is, to destroy our infrastructure, they were in the warehouses of the Russian Federation for eight months. “Podolyak said.
He noted that the Iranian Foreign Ministry, part of the secular authorities, would have issued a statement on the transfer of drones before February 24, but, according to him, in reality, the drones are being transferred through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and “practically not communicate with each other “.
“For me, a much more important question is how it happened that Iran, which has been subjected to powerful sanctions for 10 years, now has weapons of an order of magnitude better than those of the Russian Federation, which was not under sanctions until to 2014 and also, I would say, was not subject to sanctions in the field of the military-industrial complex until 2022. This is an issue that we will have to discuss with our partners, “Podolyak said.
He noted that there is now also information on a can cooperation between Iran and Rosatom.
“Why Iran, under sanctions, can do all this and nobody influences it? All these industries are working, production of drones, ballistic cruise missiles, now the nuclear industry will also work in Iran … Well, a strange situation , and we will deal with this more closely “, – said the chief adviser of the OP.
Asked whether Ukraine would impose sanctions on Iran, he replied that Ukraine, in fact, has no trade relations with this country.
At the same time, he stressed, it is necessary to take a tougher approach towards countries like Iran. Whereas they kill their own people in the streets protest against an absolutely totalitarian regimeas well as financing or supplying weapons to terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and supplying weapons to the Russian Federation, which is already genocidal against the Ukrainians, “Podolyak said.
In his view, “not only sanctions or a trade embargo are necessary”, the question must be asked more globally: why Iran allows itself to behave so with impunity.
“It seems to me that it would be possible to launch specific attacks on the production of drones and ballistic missiles, etc. A state that finances terrorist groups or a terrorist state cannot continue to do so with impunity,” said the politician.
He also stressed that the transfer of drones and weapons from Iran to terrorist states will continue until “the civilized world begins to punish here and now”.
Russia is using at least two types of Iranian unmanned aerial vehicles in Ukraine this fall: kamikaze drones Shahed-136 and multipurpose UAVs Mohajer-6.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine accused Iran of complicity in the crime of Russian aggression against Ukraine due to Tehran’s arms supplies to Russia. On 18 October, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba offered to break off diplomatic relations with Iran.
Iran first deliveries of drones to the Russian army are denied. On November 5, the Iranian foreign ministry admitted this such deliveries werebut assured that we are talking about a “limited number of drones” and deliveries “several months” before the start of a large-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine.
CNN and Reuters reported that Iran is preparing to send to Russia this year a new batch of weapons for use in the war against Ukraine, which includes, in addition to attack drones, ground-to-ground ballistic missiles with greater accuracy.
On November 3, Andrei, representative of the main intelligence directorate of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense Yusov said Iran sent a new batch of 200 drones to Russia.
