US: Iranian troops helping Russians

Washington, October 21

The White House has said that Iranian troops are directly engaged on the ground in Crimea supporting Russian drone attacks on Ukraine’s power stations and other key infrastructure.

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters that Iran has sent a relatively small number of personnel to Crimea to assist Russian troops in launching Iranian-made drones against Ukraine. “The information we have is that the Iranians have put trainers and tech support in Crimea, but it’s the Russians who are doing the piloting,” Kirby said.

The revelation of the US intelligence finding comes as the Biden administration seeks to mount international pressure on Tehran to pull back from helping Russia as it bombards soft Ukrainian civilian targets with the help of Iranian-made drones.

The Russians in recent days have increasingly turned to the Iranian-supplied drones, as well as Kalibr and Iskander cruise missiles, to carry out a barrage of attacks against Ukrainian infrastructure and non-military targets. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said this week that Russian forces have destroyed 30 per cent of Ukraine’s power stations since October.

He added that the Biden administration was looking at imposing new sanctions on Tehran and would look for ways to make it harder for Iran to sell such weapons to Russia. — AP