Russia Builds Shahed-136 Drones Independently, Tensions With Iran Rise
Russia's biggest drone manufacturing complex is almost completely self-sufficient in making Iranian-designed Shahed-136 attack drones. Western intelligence sources indicate this is putting a strain on relations between Moscow and Tehran, CNN reported. The Alabuga factory, in the Tatarstan region some 965 kms east of Moscow, now produces almost all the parts for the drones locally.
'Aluminium bars come in, engines are made from them. Microelectronics are made from electronic chips. Fuselages are made from carbon fibre and fibreglass. This is a complete location,' CEO Timur Shagivaleev said in a Russian state television documentary, reported CNN.
The Shahed-136, or Geran, according to Russia, has been one of the mainstays of Moscow's campaign of long-range strikes in Ukraine. Initially shipped from Iran following the February 2022 invasion, the drones are now produced almost exclusively in Russia.
Latest satellite images examined by CNN indicate ongoing growth at the facility. Ukraine's Defence Intelligence informed CNN that the factory is producing over 5,500 units monthly, much higher than original production levels, and at significantly less expense. In 2022, it had cost Russia approximately $200,000 (Rs 1.75 crore) to produce one drone. By 2025, that cost had dropped to about $70,000 (Rs 61.36 lakh).
According to Ukrainian authorities, Moscow has also equipped the drones with improved communication equipment, warheads and extended-range batteries, making them harder to shoot down.
CNN, citing a Western intelligence official, said that Iran initially welcomed Russia's local production but is now becoming nervous. The official indicated that Tehran fears losing control of the design and production of the Shahed.
Ali Akbar Dareini, a Tehran-based analyst for the Centre for Strategic Studies, affiliated with the Iranian president's office, said Iran might have anticipated greater Russian support, especially when Israel launched a 12-day bombing campaign against Iran's nuclear installations in June. 'Iran may have expected Russia to do more or take more steps without being required to do so,' he said.
The Western intelligence official described Russia's stance as evidence of the 'purely transactional and utilitarian nature' of the partnership, telling CNN, 'This explicit disengagement demonstrates that Russia never intervenes beyond its immediate interests, even when a partner – here an essential supplier of drones – is attacked.'
Despite tensions, analysts believe Moscow could still assist Tehran by sending back upgraded drones or related technology. David Albright, a former UN weapons inspector and head of the Institute for Science and International Security, told CNN that some of Iran's drone facilities had been damaged in Israeli strikes and suggested Russia might supply updated Shaheds to help rebuild stockpiles. 'Then Iran could reverse engineer or receive the technology to make a better quality Shahed,' he said.
Dareini told CNN that despite the current friction, Iran 'has got, and very likely will get the things it needs for its own security…whether it's military hardware, whether it's in terms of economic cooperation, technology and whatever it needs.'
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Indian Express
16 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Cattle markets at a standstill, farmers leaving animals on road: The fallout from Maharashtra butchers' strike over cow vigilantism
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar earlier this week instructed the police to prevent cow vigilantes from boarding or inspecting vehicles transporting animals. This directive comes in response to the ongoing strike by the Qureshi community, which has been protesting since July 22 against what they describe as an increase in harassment by cow vigilantes. With over 10 lakh butchers from the Qureshi community in Maharashtra going on strike, cattle markets in Akluj and Sangola taluka of Solapur district have virtually stopped operations. It, in turn, has impacted farmers who have now started leaving their unproductive animals loose across the countryside. Afsar Qureshi, member of the All India Jamiatul Quresh and the union of cattle traders, said their decision to stop trade was taken in the face of increased cow vigilantism. 'Even with proper documentation, we face violence from self-declared cow vigilantes. There is no protection for us who are carrying out trade in the legal manner,' he said. Quershi said the local police, at times, apply stringent sections of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999. 'Bribes are asked of us for freeing animals despite the court's ruling in our favour,' he said. Afsar said when their members transport animals, the vigilantes stop vehicles on highways. 'Even if we have proper papers, they confiscate our animals. Our vehicles are damaged intentionally,' he said. The Qureshi community, Afsar said, is spread across the state with a population of over 25 lakh , with a sizable portion of them being involved in the trade of cattle and meat. Since 2015, when the Devendra Fadnavis-led BJP-Shiv Sena government amended the Maharashtra Animal Preservation Act, 1976, to ban the slaughter of cow progeny, the trade in oxen and barren animals has completely collapsed, he said. Afsar noted that this single action has put over 5 lakh traditional butchers out of business. He said cattle traders are easy targets for many. 'When we are transporting the animals, many cow vigilantes frame us in false cases. They impound our vehicles and take away our animals. By the time we get court orders, we have lost business,' he said. Afsar said that while the Constitution has assured the right to livelihood, in the present environment, they are not allowed to practice the same. Senior cabinet leaders have called for action against cattle traders. Afsar said almost everyone associated with the cattle trade is targeted because of their religion, with little support from anyone. Currently, this strike has severely impacted the operations of cattle markets that handle animals for slaughter. In the cattle market located in Akluj taluka of Solapur, farmers would typically bring their non-productive male buffaloes for sale every Monday. Rajendra Kakade, secretary of the market, said the market saw business of around Rs 50 lakh on Mondays. 'Around 400-500 animals are sold with traders coming from every corner of the state,' he said. The market has completely shut down since the strike, leaving many farmers with no choice but to leave their animals on the roads. Similarly, the market in Sangola, located in the Solapur district, has also seen all activities come to a standstill. 'We hope for a quick resolution to the matter,' said Kakade. Partha Sarathi Biwas is an Assistant Editor with The Indian Express with 10+ years of experience in reporting on Agriculture, Commodities and Developmental issues. He has been with The Indian Express since 2011 and earlier worked with DNA. Partha's report about Farmers Producer Companies (FPC) as well long pieces on various agricultural issues have been cited by various academic publications including those published by the Government of India. He is often invited as a visiting faculty to various schools of journalism to talk about development journalism and rural reporting. In his spare time Partha trains for marathons and has participated in multiple marathons and half marathons. ... Read More
Mint
16 minutes ago
- Mint
Just as Russia's Most-famous dissident seemed set to go free, tragedy struck
Roger Carstens was rushing across Tel Aviv to meet Roman Abramovich, knowing he would have to ask the White House for forgiveness rather than permission. Twice before, the Biden administration had turned down requests by the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs to meet this enigmatic Russian oligarch, one of the handful of people Carstens considered a 'back channel wizard" with the influence to untangle the thorniest diplomatic knots. But in November 2023, when Carstens traveled to Israel to help American families whose loved ones Hamas had taken hostage, a message reached his phone saying Abramovich was also in town. It seemed like an unmissable chance to advance a prisoner swap that could free U.S. citizens jailed in Russia—and at the same time, rescue Vladimir Putin's archnemesis, the Russian dissident leader Alexei Navalny. The hostage envoy had been on the ground in six wars but joked the most combat he'd ever seen was wearing a suit and tie in Washington, 'trying to get anything done." He had a plan to free Navalny and the Americans but the White House didn't think the time was right to move on it. He often joked that he felt like Gulliver, tied down by Lilliputians. His perceived adversaries: senior White House and State Department officials who had been working, albeit more cautiously, toward the same end, and were weighing the geopolitical and moral risks of trading prisoners with Putin. Carstens complained to colleagues he was stuck reporting to decision makers who, in his view, had never been to combat, never smelled cordite and who sat at their desks, offering reasons why his proposals wouldn't work. This time, the former Green Beret wasn't going to give anyone enough time to tell him no. On Nov. 30, he shot off an email to Washington, where the day was still young, saying he was poised to sit with Abramovich. Minutes later, he walked into a hotel chosen for the meeting. Sitting opposite, the billionaire said he could see prisoner talks—between the Central Intelligence Agency and Russia's FSB spy service—were stalled. 'I'm not sure the FSB is passing on our messages," Carstens said. He reiterated the latest offer from the White House: a mix of prisoners that included neither Navalny—whom Germany wanted—nor Russia's own must-have, an FSB officer named Vadim Krasikov, who was serving a life sentence for murdering a Putin opponent in downtown Berlin. Carstens felt that proposal was never going to fly. 'But let me run another idea by you," he ventured, 'Not officially, but just to get your view." Carstens pitched an idea he called 'enlarging the problem." Germany would free Krasikov, if Russia freed Navalny. As an add-on, the U.S. and European allies could return various deep-cover sleeper spies in their possession, and Russia would release two Americans held on espionage charges the U.S. government strongly denied: former Marine Paul Whelan, and Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. It sounded intriguing, Abramovich said, but added that he couldn't imagine Putin would free Navalny. After 30 minutes, Carstens left, reopening his phone to see cascading messages ordering him not to hold the meeting. A few days later, Carstens heard back from Abramovich, who seemed as surprised as anybody. Putin, he said, was willing to free Navalny. That same week, guards bundled the 47-year-old dissident onto a prison train and locked the door with no word of where he was heading. Hours turned to days as Navalny read the books he'd been allowed to take from the IK-6 prison camp. He couldn't see the towns passing outside, but the train was snaking across the Ural Mountains, then north toward the Arctic Circle to the 'dead railway," built by political prisoners under Stalin. It took two weeks to reach his ice-covered destination, known as 'Polar Wolf." 'I am your new Santa Claus," he wrote in his first letter home to his wife, Yulia. 'Unfortunately, there are no reindeer, but there are huge, fluffy and very beautiful German shepherds." A few weeks after he arrived, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz logged on to a private videoconference with Joe Biden, officially to discuss the war in Ukraine. Unofficially, the prisoner trade was on the agenda. Hours earlier, the Journal's editor in chief, Emma Tucker, had met with Scholz's top aides in Switzerland. Biden had just met Paul Whelan's sister, Elizabeth, a portrait painter who struck up an easy rapport with the president. Sullivan had been in constant contact with his opposite number in Berlin ahead of the meeting. The idea was so delicate Scholz was too nervous to mention specifics over the call. 'I will fly to see you," Scholz said. 'I would be happy to." The chancellor traveled without telling his own cabinet, giving such short notice that the only plane the German government could book was a medium-haul Airbus A321, which had to refuel in Iceland. There were no aides and no note-takers in the Feb. 9 meeting, just Biden and Scholz. Hours earlier, Tucker Carlson aired an interview with Putin at the Kremlin, where the former Fox host pushed the Russian president to release Gershkovich. Putin, chastened by Carlson, looked embarrassed. The pieces all seemed to be clicking into place. In the Oval Office, Scholz agreed to free the assassin Krasikov as the centerpiece of a broader deal. The chancellor would rescue Navalny from his Arctic prison—and, he hoped, boost the aging U.S. president's chances in what was certain to be a bruising re-election campaign. 'For you, I will do this," Scholz told Biden. On Feb. 15, 2024, the narrow streets of Munich were lined with black motorcades delivering the West's most important leaders to the Bavarian city's annual security conference. Carstens wasn't registered as a speaker or panelist, but he quietly slipped out of Washington on a red-eye flight bound for Germany. By now, the administration was accelerating the Navalny trade toward completion, but preferred to keep Carstens on the periphery of any Russia prisoner talks. Christo Grozev was already there, waiting anxiously in a cafe close to the venue's security perimeter. The Bulgarian investigative journalist and spy-hunter felt the deal was almost done, yet he and Carstens wanted to be as close as possible to the West's top security officials to spot-check that nothing would derail it. Odessa Rae, the 'Navalny" film producer, was texting from Dubai in route to Ukraine after meeting their Russian contact, Stanislav Petlinsky. Vice President Kamala Harris was flying in on Air Force Two, officially to deliver a keynote address, while more quietly representing Biden at a meeting with Slovenian leaders to confirm the trade could include two Russian sleeper spies in their custody: a married couple posing as Argentine nationals. Germany's foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, was at the conference, and still uneasy about the moral line her country was inching toward, but Secretary of State Antony Blinken was set to meet her and soothe any concerns. Navalny's wife, Yulia, was also in Munich, on hand to address lingering doubts. Next to Grozev, messaging contacts to try to piece together the state of play, was Maria Pevchikh, Navalny's friend and head of investigations. Their location felt ominous. Seventeen years earlier, at the same Munich gathering, Russia's president delivered a speech castigating the world order in which America was 'one master, one sovereign," a diatribe considered the starting gun of his war against the West. Now, within touching distance of the biggest East-West prisoner swap since the Soviet collapse, the memory of that speech was like a specter. As the evening wrapped toward a close, Pevchikh raised a question, like a terrible premonition: 'What if they kill him?" After years studying Russian intelligence services, Grozev was confident her concern wouldn't come to pass. There was a protocol, he reassured her, a methodology for prison swaps upheld since the Cold War. The Journal even had prewritten articles, ready to go, the moment Navalny walked free. The next day, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Christopher Wray was sitting down for lunch with the chiefs of Britain's MI6 and Germany's BND intelligence agency. Their discreet and thankless work was about to pay off in the very real gift of freedom not only for Navalny but also for Gershkovich, whose reporting Wray admired. But as the meal unfolded, dignitaries began reaching for their phones, buzzing with news from Russia. The most powerful security czars in the Western alliance turned to each other in horror and bewilderment. 'Alexei Navalny has died in prison," the Kremlin's state newswire announced. 'The cause of death is being established." The guests rose one by one to start fielding calls. Wray rushed upstairs to confer with Blinken. America's top diplomat immediately shot back: 'Get me Yulia." An aide struggled to reach Navalny's wife and came back with the number for Grozev. Weaving through the tightly controlled security cordons, European and American officials were scrambling to find each other and confer on what would happen next. The news spread through the hallways and coffee line where a German diplomat blurted out in full earshot of reporters, 'Oh no! We were working on getting him out!" Yulia Navalnaya, widow of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, reacts as she speaks during the Munich Security Conference on Feb. 16, 2024. Grozev guided Navalny's ashen-faced widow through the hotel gates to the secretary of state's suite. The two embraced, then sat down, and Yulia delivered a powerful message: Putin must be punished for the misery he has wrought. Minutes later she walked down toward the lectern in the shellshocked conference hall with delegates standing to applaud, or crying in their seats, her eyes filled with tears and righteous anger. 'I want Putin, his entourage, Putin's friends, and his government to know they will pay for what they have done to our country, to our family, and my husband," she said. Chancellor Scholz wanted to see Yulia but wasn't sure if the woman who had minutes earlier discovered she was a widow would want time with her family. 'I want to meet," she responded and arrived, somehow still composed, in the hotel suite where the chancellor was waiting. 'I have one request," Yulia said, before turning to the question of Krasikov. 'Do not release that man." Across the world, the secret club of people who had labored at organizing an exchange were reeling as its one necessary component was lying dead in an Arctic morgue. Officials across the West had worked for months to free not just Navalny but a growing list of Americans seized by the Kremlin as bargaining chips. CIA officers and their European partners had hunted down Russian spies undercover in an Arctic research institute, the front lines of Ukraine and the suburbs of an Alpine capital. The Justice Department had extradited Russian cybercriminals arrested in the Maldives and on a Swiss mountainside helipad—high-wire legal and diplomatic maneuvers that had given the U.S. trading stock for an exchange that was now on ice. In Los Angeles, Journal publisher Almar Latour was visiting a museum exhibit of art made by prisoners from Soviet gulags, and wondering if a dark gray pencil sketch was drawn in the same camp as Navalny, when his phone rang. It was Carstens, who had landed in Munich just in time to learn it was all for nought. The U.S. could have brought Navalny back alive if it had acted with more urgency, Carstens said. 'If only I had moved faster." The special envoy was blaming himself for not putting more pressure on the White House. 'We could have wrapped this up in August!" Rae, on her way to Ukraine, was boarding a flight, talking to a fellow passenger about her film, neither of them aware until she glanced at her phone that its subject, her friend, had just died. In Russia's IK-17 labor camp, Paul Whelan was trading cigarettes to place a call to his family: 'If they are willing to kill Navalny they could do something to me. Poison me. Break my leg?" His sister Elizabeth was quizzing a case officer on Carstens's staff over text messages about the consequences of a death she was sure wasn't an accident. The IK-17 Penal Colony, where American Paul Whelan was transferred to serve a 16-year sentence on espionage charges he and the U.S. government denied. Jake Sullivan was on his office sofa when a delegation from The Wall Street Journal stepped in. Their meeting, pre-scheduled, was meant to deliver good news, but word of Navalny's death, hours earlier, lent it the air of a wake. Sullivan had a habit of looking toward the floor, or to one side, as he carefully deliberated the angles of a problem. After a long pause, he spoke: 'I never thought a deal with Navalny would work." But he also hadn't expected Putin to kill him, and still wasn't sure if he would ever know the truth behind the dissident's death. Navalny's supporters had lost everything—the man they were trying to save and Russia's dreams for a democratic future. And the Journal, whose reporter, Gershkovich, had now spent 323 days in the Moscow jail where Stalin's henchman once executed purged officials, was no closer to freeing him than in the first hours of his arrest. But in the cloud of grief and disorientation, the national security adviser could also glimpse a new possibility. Germany had crossed the psychological threshold of agreeing to free a murderer—and perhaps they would accept other political prisoners in Navalny's place. The question hanging over that analysis was whether Putin had come to the same fatal conclusion. In the weeks to come, CIA officials would fly to meet their Russian counterparts in Saudi hotels, booked under false names, carrying eyes-only hard-copy lists of prisoners the West could trade with the Kremlin. The world would finally see the fruits of their labor when, on Aug. 1, 2024 six planes delivered 24 prisoners and two children to an exchange point outside a Turkish air terminal, a mix of Russian spies, hackers, cybercriminals—and Krasikov—traded for Russian dissidents, German convicts, and Americans including Whelan, Gershkovich, and other journalists. That trade, the largest East-West swap in modern history, would cement a cold, inescapable fact about the emerging world order: taking and trading prisoners, and bending the justice system to do it, is now what powerful countries do, a transactional order of statecraft encapsulated by Navalny's arrest, the campaign to free him, and his tragic death. For now, however, looking up from his office couch, Sullivan engaged the Journal without offering false hope. The newspaper's lawyers had brought Gershkovich's mother, Ella Milman, and she was looking right at him, asking: 'Doesn't this create more urgency to free Evan?" 'It might," he said. 'It's not a breaking point," he added. 'We will get this done. I see a pathway." Drew Hinshaw and Joe Parkinson are leaders on The Wall Street Journal's World Enterprise Team. This piece is adapted from their new book, 'Swap: A Secret History of the New Cold War," which will be published on Aug. 19 by HarperCollins (which, like the Journal, is owned by News Corp).
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Business Standard
16 minutes ago
- Business Standard
Govt plans to ease petrol pump licensing norms amid energy security push
The government is considering further easing the norms for setting up petrol pumps in the world's fastest-growing fuel market, in light of the evolving energy security paradigm and commitment to decarbonisation, according to an official order. The government had in 2019 relaxed the norms for setting up petrol pumps, opening the door for non-oil companies to enter the fuel retailing business. At that time, companies with a net worth of Rs 250 crore were permitted to sell petrol and diesel, provided they committed to setting up infrastructure for at least one new-generation alternative fuel, such as CNG, LNG, biofuels, or EV charging, within three years of beginning their operations. For companies wanting to sell petrol and diesel to retail and bulk consumers, the networth criteria was set at Rs 500 crore. The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has now constituted an expert committee to review the 2019 guidelines for granting authorisation to market transportation fuels. The expert committee will "assess the effectiveness of the framework envisaged in Resolution dated November 8, 2019, in ensuring energy security and market efficiency; align the policy framework with national commitment towards decarbonisation, electrical mobility and promotion of alternative fuel; and address issues in implementation of existing guidelines," the order said. The committee is headed by Sukhmal Jain, former director (marketing) of Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL). Other members of the four-member committee are Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) Director General P Manoj Kumar, FIPI member PS Ravi and Arun Kumar, Director (Marketing) in the ministry. An August 6 notice of the ministry sought stakeholder/general public comments/suggestions on the matter within 14 days. Prior to the 2019 change, to obtain a fuel retailing license in India, a company had to invest or commit to invest Rs 2,000 crore in either hydrocarbon exploration and production, refining, pipelines or liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminals. This norm was relaxed in 2019. That year, the government allowed any entity with a net worth of Rs 250 crore to get a licence to retail petrol and diesel to either bulk or retail consumers. For those seeking authorisation for both retail and bulk, the minimum networth was set at Rs 500 crore at the time of application. For retail authorisation, the entities are required to set up at least 100 retail outlets. Also, retailers are required to establish 5 per cent of the total outlets in rural areas within five years. Global energy giants have been eyeing the Indian fuel market for a long time. French energy giant TotalEnergies, in partnership with Adani Group, had in November 2018 applied for a licence to retail petrol and diesel through 1,500 outlets. BP too has formed a partnership with Reliance Industries to set up petrol pumps. While oil trader Trafigura's downstream arm, Puma Energy, had applied for a license, Saudi Arabia's Aramco has been in talks to enter the sector. State-owned oil marketing companies Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL) currently own most of the 97,804 petrol pumps in the country. Reliance Industries, Nayara Energy (formerly Essar Oil), and Royal Dutch Shell are the private players in the market, but with limited presence. The joint venture of Reliance, which operates the world's largest oil refining complex, and BP has 1,991 outlets. Nayara has 6,763 pumps, while Shell has just 355. Currently, IOC is the market leader with 40,666 petrol pumps in the country, followed by BPCL with 23,959 outlets, and HPL with 23,901 fuel stations.
