Ukraine blasts more than 300 Iranian kamikaze drones out of the sky in blow for Putin
Russia is likely being forced to rely on weapons sourced from outside the country as stocks run low, the MoD has suggested.
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However, air force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat told a briefing on Friday that Ukrainian forces were having significant success in preventing them from hitting civilian targets.
Speaking last week, Mr Ihnat estimated that the Ukrainian air force was managing to shoot down the vast majority of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) launched by Russia.
He said: “If we take two weeks of extreme use of our combat forces against drones (Shahed-136) and the effectiveness of their downing, then today we have a figure of 85 percent.”
On Tuesday President Volodymyr Zelensky told a conference on Ukraine reconstruction Russian rockets and Iran-made drones had destroyed more than a third of his country's energy sector.
Speaking via video link, Mr Zelensky also told the conference in Berlin Ukraine had yet to receive "a single cent" towards a fast recovery plan worth a total £14.7billion ($17billion).
He explained: ”Russia is destroying everything so that it is harder for us to get through the winter.”
Attendees included German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and other senior politicians and officials.
Speaking to Express.co.uk earlier this month, former US Marine John Sennett, who lives in Ukraine with his Belarusian wife Natasha, described hearing several drones flying over his Kyiv flat, including one which smashed into a nearby building, killing at least four people including a pregnant woman.
He explained: “At about 6.30, 6.45 this morning we heard this buzzing noise and then literally maybe three minutes later a huge explosion.
“And so we ran in ran into the hallway and we heard another buzzing noise and then another explosion, probably 700 metres from where we live, I’m guessing about that.
“And then we heard another one a little bit later and then we heard a little bit more buzzing here and there and then they put an air raid on saying Kaliber missiles had been shot from the Caspian Sea, but they hit Vinnytsia and Lviv, they didn't hit Kyiv.”
He added: “They sound like a little motor scooter, like a moped, like the older ones that are a little bit louder.
Iran has denied Ukrainian and Western accusations that it is supplying drones to Russia.
However, in September the Ministry of Defence suggested it was “highly likely” Russia was deploying them as its stocks of weaponry “dwindled”.
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