Iranian Foreign Minister Hosein Amirabdolahian admitted Saturday that his country has delivered a «limited» number of drones to Russia but qualified that the consignments were sent before the outbreak of the Ukrainian war.
«We have limited ourselves to providing Russia with a limited number of drones, months before the war in Ukraine,» the Iranian minister explained Saturday after weeks of accusations by the United States and its allies about Russia’s use of Iranian drones with explosive charges during the conflict.
The United States has also accused Iran of providing missiles — the latter aspect denied by the Iranian minister as «completely wrong» — as well as of sending military personnel to Russian-occupied Crimea to teach Russians how to use the aircraft and provide technical assistance. The minister did not comment in this regard.
The Ukrainian military claims it has so far shot down hundreds of Iranian-made Shahed-136 «kamikaze» drones. Russia is believed to have ordered some 2,400 drones of this model.
The Iranian minister has also asked the Ukrainian authorities to share with Tehran all evidence of such attacks.
«If it is proven to us that Russia used Iranian drones in the war against Ukraine, we will not stand idly by,» he said at a press conference reported by the official Iranian news agency IRNA.
«Our position regarding the war in Ukraine is to stop the conflict, return the parties to negotiations and get the refugees back to their homes,» he added.
