A manufacturing plant in Russia’s Tatarstan region has significantly scaled up its production of Iranian-designed drones, using a range of Chinese components, and recruiting a low-skilled workforce of Russian teenagers and African women,

In 2023, the factory produced 2,738 Shahed drones, and by the first nine months of 2024, it more than doubled this output, manufacturing 5,760 drones. According to anonymous sources, the factory is also assembling thousands of “fake” drones aimed at exhausting Ukraine’s air defense systems.

Russia's aviation chief said Friday that an Azerbaijani Airlines plane that eventually crashed in Kazakhstan tried to land in the Chechen city of Grozny as it was being attacked by Ukrainian drones.The Azerbaijan Airlines jet crashed near the Kazakh city of Aktau on Wednesday after attempting to land at its destination in Grozny and then diverting far off course across the Caspian Sea.