Ukrainian soldiers have found in their territory the remains of what is apparently a civilian-use drone manufactured by a Chinese company, modernized and armed, allegedly used by Russia, CNN reported on Thursday.
The drone was shot down in a Ukrainian forest whose location is not specified and its remains were shown to journalists from the US network by Ukrainian soldiers after assuring that they had shot it down with their "Ak-47" automatic weapons.
According to CNN, it was a "Mugin-5" drone, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) manufactured by a Chinese company based in the port city of Xiamen, on the east coast of the Asian country.
The chain cites some technology bloggers as saying that these devices are known as 'Alibaba drones', since they have been available for sale for around 15,000 dollars on websites in the Chinese market, including distributors Alibaba and Taobao.
The company Mugin Limited confirmed to CNN that it was the fuselage of a device of its manufacture and described the incident as "deeply unfortunate".
For the network, this is the latest example of the use of a civilian drone being modernized and armed for use in Russia's invasion of Ukraine, a sign that the patterns of warfare used by Moscow are changing rapidly.
Ukrainian soldiers told reporters that the drone was flying very low when it was located and close enough to be shot down with automatic weapons, and that the drone had been adapted to carry a bomb.
The armed commercial drone did not have a camera installed, meaning it could not have been used for surveillance, and essentially making it similar to a "dumb bomb," according to Chris Lincoln-Jones, a retired British Army officer and drone specialist. consulted by the American chain.
"This particular drone that we've been looking at would be much more effective if it had a decent camera," Lincoln-Jones said.
He added that this commercial drone incident adds further evidence to the theory that Russia is not the military superpower the world might have hoped for.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
