Drone remnants found in Moldova near border with Ukraine.

Fragments of a Shahed-type drone were found in Moldova in a field two kilometers from the country's border with Ukraine, the Moldovan Border Police reported on Feb.

17. According to the border police, drone debris was found near the village of Etulia, a Moldovan border settlement some 15 kilometers northeast of the Ukrainian Danube port of Reni and almost 40 kilometers northwest of Izmail. Access to the area where the drone parts were located has been restricted, the police said.

The discovery comes a week after Moldova found a warhead containing 50 kilograms of explosives near the crash site of a Russian Shahed drone. Chisinau suspected the drone was shot down by Ukrainian air defense during a Russian attack against Odesa Oblast overnight on Feb.

9-10. Moldovan Prime Minister Dorin Recean said in a press conference on Feb.

14 that the radar systems Moldova received from France in December 2023 cannot detect Shahed drones. Previously, Russian drone strikes against Odesa Oblast led to drone debris being falling on Romanian soil in the autumn of 2023. In response, Bucharest implemented additional security measures in the border region, which included building shelters and air defense systems.

Ukraine pins hopes on home-made drones to counter Russia

President Volodymyr Zelensky announced on Feb.

7 that the Ukrainian military would create a separate branch of the Armed Forces dedicated to drones.

Throughout the full-scale invasion, Ukraine has been a drone tactics pioneer, from applying purpose-built military UAVs to weaponizing civilian models...

The Kyiv IndependentKateryna Hodunova