Chinese Drone Experts Aiding Sanctioned Russian Weapons Maker: Report

Udumbara Udumbara
Sep 27, 2025 - 09:55 Updated: Sep 27, 2025 - 09:50
0
Chinese Drone Experts Aiding Sanctioned Russian Weapons Maker: Report

.

Chinese drone experts have traveled to Russia to work on military drones at a state-owned weapons manufacturer already under Western sanctions, Reuters reported.

The Chinese experts visited IEMZ Kupol’s weapon facilities more than six times since mid-2024, Reuters reported on Thursday, citing two European security officials and company documents reviewed by the outlet.

During this period, Kupol also received shipments of Chinese-made attack and surveillance drones through a Russian intermediary, the documents and officials suggested.

Kupol was among more than 150 individuals and entities sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department for materially supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine. It was blacklisted in 2023, specifically for producing anti-aircraft equipment and one-way attack drones.
Since then, Kupol has manufactured thousands of Garpiya drones, a Russian variant of Iran’s Shahed suicide drone. On Sept. 7, in what Ukraine’s Air Force described as the largest drone assault since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Russia launched 810 of these drones in a single barrage against cities across Ukraine.

One Kupol document reviewed by Reuters indicated that a group of Chinese experts visited Kupol’s facilities in the city of Izhevsk to train Russian staff in assembling and operating Chinese-made drones. Although they were officially presented as employees of TSK Vektor—a Russian company also under sanctions—European officials told Reuters they were in fact from Sichuan AEE, a Chinese drone manufacturer.

Kupol also appeared to have obtained more than a dozen suicide drones built by Sichuan AEE. Shipping records included in the documents showed deliveries routed to Russia through TSK Vektor.

This collaboration appears to have produced a new drone, the Garpiya-3. This model is reportedly more advanced than its predecessors, with a 1,200-mile range and a 110-pound payload.

The Treasury Department last year revealed that China’s Xiamen Limbach Aircraft Engine Company was producing the engines for the Garpiya-3, while other components, such as its data processing system, also appeared to be sourced from China. Final assembly took place in Russia at Kupol’s facilities.

Beyond the suicide drone, documents seen by Reuters suggested Kupol is interested in Chinese-made reusable surveillance models capable of carrying weapons. One letter described a joint Chinese-Russian project to create a new platform called the GA-21, likely modeled after Iran’s Shahed-107, which can be used for both surveillance and strikes.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry claimed to know nothing about the drone collaboration.

Kyiv has repeatedly warned of foreign components in Moscow’s arms production. In a Telegram post on Sept. 21, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russian forces had launched more than 1,500 drones, 1,280 guided bombs, and 50 missiles in the previous week alone.

Weapons recovered from the attacks, he said, contained over 132,000 foreign-made components from Europe, America, China, Japan, and dozens of other countries.

“These technologies help Russia produce weapons on a massive scale,” Zelenskyy said. “All of it is used for terror against our people.”

.

Read More