

A drawing of a Shahed-136 unmanned aerial vehicle, created by Airwars for a cross-border multimedia investigation into Russia's use of the Iran-designed Shahed in its war against Ukraine. Screenshot, Airwars
Investigating Russia’s Proliferating Use — And Supply — Of Attack Drones Against Ukraine
Sanjana Varghese, formerly an investigator for UK-based transparency watchdog Airwars, recently worked on a cross-border collaboration for that site looking into Russia’s use and supply of Iranian-made Shahed drones in the war in Ukraine.
The series, published in partnership with the Financial Times, Der Spiegel, and Danish newspaper Information, exposed how, despite sanctions, European components have found their way to Russia’s drone manufacturers; how drone warfare has reached an unprecedented scale; and the devastating impact of Shahed drones on Ukrainian cities and civilians.
The investigation also stood out because its storytelling method employed innovative multimedia — such as including the sound and the shape of the drones as people experience them from the ground. “You see them before you hear them,” Varghese observed — thanks to their slow speed and distinctive low, buzzing sound. “This must be a terrifying thing for a civilian.”
“Drones and UAVs have become more accessible, not just for military [actors]… you’re seeing now that non-state actors, armed groups, militias, paramilitaries, are being able to use these drones in ways that a formalized military might not be able to,” Varghese added, during a ‘IJ4EU Confidential’ webinar. That event was part of an ongoing series offering behind-the-scenes looks into collaborative journalistic projects supported by the Investigative Journalism for Europe (IJ4EU) program.
“The use of drones in Ukraine is utterly unprecedented anywhere in the world,” noted webinar host Timothy Large, director of independent media programs at the International Press Institute (IPI). “These unmanned aerial vehicles are used for everything from spying on enemy positions to guiding artillery to dropping bombs on targets.”
Large, along with Milica Miletić, an IJ4EU project coordinator for IPI, talked with Varghese about the data and methodology behind the research, and the investigation’s biggest challenges — such as tracking sanctions-busting culpability along a complex supply chain, and striking a balance between immersive media and reporting on the issue with sensitivity.
Three Investigations, Many Revelations
Funds from the IJ4EU supported three major investigations: the first part was published by Der Spiegel and Airwars and revealed the sale of components from numerous German companies to a key supplier of Russian Orlan-10 drones used extensively in Ukraine. The second report, published by the Financial Times and Airwars, examined Russia and Iran’s possible covert collaboration to manufacture Iranian-designed drones on Russian soil. The final part, published by Airwars, Der Spiegel, and Denmark’s Information, explored the role of Iranian Shaheds in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This last exposé, “A Year of the Shahed: How Iranian Drones Became a Key Tool in Russia’s Arsenal,’’ won a 2024 SIGMA Award for excellence in data journalism.
Varghese and Danish journalist Nikolaj Houmann Mortensen led the research behind the third investigation. They discerned attack patterns, gathered first-person experiences of drones, and explained the history of their use. They presented their reporting through photo and audio evidence, data visualizations, Scrollytelling, and 3D-drawings.
Slow moving, powerful, and relatively cheap, the Iranian Shahed is terrorising Ukrainian civilians.
In our new article, hear the infamous noise of the drone’s lawnmower-like motor, alongside the voices of civilians living in this terrifying landscape.https://t.co/O4hFO66WEH
— Airwars (@airwars) September 11, 2023
Just a few months after the investigations were published, the US imposed sanctions against three of the companies highlighted in the reporting. And in August 2023, the director of industrial components at one of the companies mentioned was arrested in Cyprus for supplying parts to the Russian military.
“I’m not entirely sure whether these arrests and these sanctions have a one-to-one impact on the number of components that are moving in this way,” said Varghese. “But I think it’s certainly a good step forward, and I think it can be a little bit of a deterrent as well.”
‘Cat and Mouse’
Varghese explained that their team’s reporting focused on two principal areas: how components from EU — particularly German — companies find their way into the production of Orlan-10 drones despite the drone manufacturer being sanctioned, and how Iranian Shahed-136 UAVs have become a key part of Russia’s arsenal.
Airwars describes Russia’s Orlan-10 drones as ” [t]he workhorse of the Russian armed forces in Ukraine… heavily involved in the destruction of Ukrainian cities.” The drone “provides important reconnaissance data, corrects artillery fire, and can even be equipped with grenades.”
Airwars and Der SPIEGEL found that foreign components repeatedly turn up in Russian military equipment and, more specifically, German-manufactured microchips, thermal sensors, cameras, and antennas may have ended up at the sanctioned manufacturer of Orlan-10 drones via a Russia-based import company. The investigation reported that many of these components are shipped indirectly through hubs in China, Hong Kong, and elsewhere — and that it is unclear whether the companies intentionally violated sanctions. Airwars pointed out that foreign components are repeatedly found in Russian military equipment, including the Orlan-10, thanks to a complex network of transshipment points, shell companies, and other “diversionary mechanisms.”
Although the Russian-based drone manufacturer identified has been under US sanctions since 2016, the reporting suggested that it has been able to import “huge volumes of microelectronics and components used in the Orlan-10.” Commercially available data shows that between the beginning of February and the end of September 2022, the import company successfully bought products from around 20 German firms — for a total of more than 190 shipments. Goods from one German semiconductor giant alone were shipped 55 times.
“Customs data shows that manufacturers rarely, if ever, export products directly,” Airwars explained. Instead, they tend to rely upon a complex network of transshipment points, shell companies, and other “diversionary mechanisms.” Other companies supplying parts through this murky supply chain come from China, with some also based in places such as Serbia, Turkey, and India. Airwars also found that, per an earlier investigation by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) and Reuters, the sanctioned import company operates out of the same St Petersburg address as the Orlan manufacturer.
‘Slow-Moving, Powerful, and Relatively Cheap’
The Ukrainian armed forces and others claim that the Iranian-designed Shahed 136 and the smaller Shahed 131 — described as “slow-moving, powerful, and relatively cheap” — are behind Russia’s widespread attacks on Ukrainian cities and infrastructure hundreds of miles from the frontline. These unmanned aerial vehicles also have been linked to the deaths and injuries of civilians all across the country.

Screenshot of an Iranian defense ministry video of the Shahed-136 military trials in 2021. Image: Screenshot, Airwars
Shaheds are classified as one-way attack (or kamikaze) aerial vehicles, carrying explosives in their nose. And while they lack the remote guidance abilities of other, more sophisticated UAVs and rely on pre-programmed geo-coordinates, they still offer Russia an arsenal of munitions of relatively low-cost and fairly high accuracy. Due to their low speed, however, they are generally used to target infrastructure or in coordinated attacks along with ground or air-launched missiles or rockets.
Moscow has claimed these drones are locally produced, but journalists and open source investigators point to their “distinctive delta wing shape, cheap components, and low, buzzing sound” as earmarks of Iranian design and construction. (Neither Russia or Iran responded to the request for comment on these investigations, Airwars noted.)
When the drone investigation was published in September 2023, Russian forces had launched nearly 2,000 Shaheds into Ukrainian territory during the previous year. Airwars analyzed publicly available data to find patterns in Russia’s Shahed use and targets.

With information from the Ukrainian government and ministry of defense, Airwars journalists visualized the amount of reported Shahed launches into Ukraine between September 2022 and August 2023. Image: Screenshot, Airwars
Mysterious Factory
In the second part of the series, Airwars and the Financial Times examined Russia’s “covert drone partnership with Iran” and two countries’ close cooperation in developing a factory in Tatarstan. The facility was for a company previously engaged in farming tech and agricultural UAVs, but that has now begun producing reconnaissance drones for Russia’s defense ministry. And while US intelligence claims that Moscow has already imported hundreds of Shaheds directly from Tehran, it also argued that this mysterious factory site was expanding — for reasons unknown.
Varghese said she and Danish journalist Nikolaj Houman Mortensen “spent hours and hours digging into a niche forum that only residents in this part of Russia use, and looking for recruiting boards and things like this to kind of piece together what was happening in this facility.” Though they did not find clear proof of Shaheds being manufactured at the Tatarstan plant, they did uncover links to an Iranian presence and evidence suggesting it would manufacture drones. According to ads and public posts the pair found, the business park where the facility is located had launched a recruitment drive by placing ads for Farsi speakers to “translate technical documents” in February 2023. And they noted that the DC-based think tank Institute for Science and International Security discovered job advertisements for UAV engineers had run in the facility’s area.
Tapping a New Battlefield Data Source
The centerpiece of the Shahed investigation involved an large dataset from an unexpected source. Varghese explained that, not long after the war started, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense began posting daily Telegram updates on the number of Shahed UAVs launched into the country and how many were intercepted by its air defenses.
“While we were working on this series, we realized that there’s this big dataset which is, I don’t want to say untouched, but we weren’t seeing a lot of use of it,” she recounted. “We realized there’s so much you can do with that data.”
Varghese and a team of researchers at Airwars combined that data with other verification techniques and information: “We looked at local media reporting. We looked at local reports of where drones are falling. We looked at a lot of other kinds of second-hand verification, as well as visual evidence, to make sure that we’re getting the numbers right.”
Other sources of data they used included Import Genius, which tracks global imports and exports, subscription-based services, and UN databases tracking the movement of goods.

An Airwars data visualization mapped the reported locations of Shahed launches in Ukraine. Image: Screenshot, Airwars
Telling the Story Through ‘Immersive Exploration’
IPI’s Large noted that the investigations’ use of text, graphics, audio, photos, and interactive maps tried to create an “immersive exploration” of what it’s like to see, hear, and exist in an area where Shaheds operate. “You’ve heard the noise of the drone. It sounds a bit like a lawnmower engine. You’ve seen this shape in the infographic,” he said.
Varghese discussed with moderators the challenges of balancing the multimedia tools with concerns for the audience, “making sure that you’re doing a good job to reflect the lived reality and the experiences of people who are having to deal with this.”
“We want people to see what they’re reading about… but it’s not just a beautifully designed multimedia piece that then lives online,” Varghese added. “It’s also important to make sure that we’re being sensitive and careful when speaking to people who have to deal with this.” One key way to do this, she pointed out, was to make the story’s immersive elements an ‘opt-in’ addition, instead of an automatic feature
In the end, the full complement of text, images, and audio make for a more complete, compelling story, she said. “Those design elements and those visual elements… brought home why this drone has proliferated so much in this very crowded landscape.”
Watch the full webinar here.
Alexa van Sickle is a journalist and editor with experience across online and print journalism, publishing, and think tanks in the UK, US, and continental Europe. Before joining GIJN, she was a senior editor for the foreign correspondence magazine Roads & Kingdoms. She is currently based in Vienna, Austria.