{"id":115179,"date":"2023-12-18T08:56:23","date_gmt":"2023-12-18T13:56:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/?p=115179"},"modified":"2023-12-18T08:56:23","modified_gmt":"2023-12-18T13:56:23","slug":"researchers-cite-western-progress-in-curbing-electronics-transfers-to-russian-iranian-drone-facility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/2023\/12\/18\/researchers-cite-western-progress-in-curbing-electronics-transfers-to-russian-iranian-drone-facility\/","title":{"rendered":"Researchers Cite Western Progress in Curbing Electronics Transfers to Russian-Iranian Drone Facility"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"VOA \u2014 WASHINGTON \u2014 <\/span>U.S. and Ukrainian researchers say Western nations are making progress in trying to curb illicit transfers of Western electronic components to a Russian facility suspected of making Iranian-designed attack drones, but that more needs to be done.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The White House released a U.S. intelligence finding June 8 asserting Russia was receiving Iranian materials needed to build an attack drone manufacturing plant in its Alabuga special economic zone.<\/p>\n

Russia has said it relies on its own resources in using drones to attack Ukraine; Iran has acknowledged supplying drones to Russia but only before Moscow\u2019s February 2022 Ukraine invasion. Neither Russia\u2019s Washington embassy nor Iran\u2019s U.N. mission in New York responded to questions about the Alabuga plant emailed by VOA Thursday.<\/p>\n

The researchers pointed to the U.S. Commerce Department\u2019s December 6 placement of 11 Russian companies on its list of entities requiring a license for items subject to export controls. Commerce officials cited the companies\u2019 association with the suspected Alabuga drone facility. Commerce expanded the items subject to U.S. export controls in February to include semiconductors and other drone components used by Russian and Iranian entities on the Entity List.<\/p>\n

David Albright, president of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, one of the researchers interviewed by VOA in recent weeks, said he \u201ccommends\u201d Commerce for sanctioning the 11 Russian companies and considers the move a sign of progress.<\/p>\n

Vladyslav Vlasiuk, a Ukrainian sanctions researcher serving as an adviser to the Ukrainian president\u2019s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, also welcomed the U.S. move.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are happy that the U.S. government is taking actions aimed at thwarting certain Russian facilities, including Alabuga, and thus making an impact on Russia\u2019s military industry,\u201d Vlasiuk told VOA in a Thursday phone call.<\/p>\n

Vlasiuk and Albright said the Biden administration should go further, though.<\/p>\n

The administration has not sanctioned JSC Alabuga, the plant\u2019s owner, although several of its apparent subsidiaries were added to the Commerce list December 6.<\/p>\n

Albright said the U.S. Treasury and State departments should sanction JSC Alabuga and associated companies to discourage foreign businesses from dealing with them, calling such designations \u201clong overdue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vlasiuk said Ukraine also would like to see the United States sanction JSC Alabuga and other companies that Kyiv has identified as engaged in Russia\u2019s drone industry.<\/p>\n

Asked by VOA for the U.S. position on sanctioning JSC Alabuga, Commerce said November 28 it \u201cdoes not comment on potential deliberations related to Entity List actions.\u201d<\/p>\n

The statement added that \u201ccontinuing to respond to Russia\u2019s unjustified war against Ukraine remains a high priority for the department\u201d and listed several\u00a0U.S. actions<\/a>\u00a0taken to crack down on illicit networks for sending chips and other items to Russia.<\/p>\n

The State Department referred VOA questions about Alabuga to Commerce, while the Treasury Department did not respond to a November 25 VOA email about Alabuga.<\/p>\n

Albright also pointed to the interest of several European governments in using his institute’s research on the Alabuga plant to try to disrupt its access to electronic components made by companies headquartered in their territories. His research is based on documents apparently leaked from Alabuga to\u00a0The Washington Post<\/em>, which first reported their existence in August.<\/p>\n

Albright’s institute has reported that the documents appear authentic and describe Alabuga supply-chain procurement, production capabilities, and plans for manufacturing Russian-branded copies of Iran’s Shahed 136 attack drone.<\/p>\n

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\"FILE<\/div>\n<\/div>
FILE – A view shows a part of a suicide drone Geran, which local authorities consider to be Iranian made unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) Shahed-131\/136, shot down during a Russian overnight strike in Odesa, Ukraine, May 4, 2023.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

While more than half of the electronics on the assembly list for Alabuga\u2019s Shahed 136 drones are made by U.S. companies, according to Albright\u2019s review of the documents, some of the rest come from four Europe-based companies, his institute has said. Those include Switzerland-based TE Connectivity and u-blox, Netherlands-based NXP Semiconductors, and STMicroelectronics, which is headquartered in Switzerland and has manufacturing plants in the Netherlands.<\/p>\n

\u201cSwitzerland and the Netherlands certainly are interested in the information we have to offer,\u201d Albright said.<\/p>\n

Vlasiuk also credited the two European nations for working with Ukraine on the issue.<\/p>\n

“We are in constant communication with the Dutch government on sanctions and they have been very helpful and proactive,\u201d Vlasuk said. \u201cAs for the Swiss, it has been a little harder, but we also are in contact and they mostly are adopting the sanctions of the EU, which is good.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response to VOA questions about Alabuga and Albright\u2019s research, the Dutch Foreign Affairs Ministry said it is a \u201cpriority\u201d to prevent the circumvention of sanctions designed to make it as difficult as possible for Russia to continue waging war on Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo that end, we undertake many actions with international partners, both visible and invisible. The ministry cannot comment on contacts with individual companies or organizations,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

The Swiss government provided no comment after VOA emailed its Washington embassy last month to request one.<\/p>\n

Albright and Vlasiuk said Western electronics makers also must do more to stop their parts from ending up in Alabuga\u2019s drones.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the electronics industry, companies send off millions of components to distributors who could care less about the end user,\u201d Albright said. \u201cSo electronics manufacturers need to rapidly work with distributors on policies promoting due diligence. Manufacturers need to say we are just not going to make sales of these critical items unless we really know who the end user is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vlasiuk said Ukraine is unhappy with finding Western parts in attack drones launched by Russia and with how the manufacturers explain the phenomenon. \u201cThey say, \u2018we are not supplying anything officially to Russia,\u2019 Of course they do not. So I think that they could have tightened their compliance and know-your-customer procedures,\u201d Vlasiuk said.<\/p>\n

In a Saturday statement sent to VOA, a spokesperson for Swiss company u-blox said the use of its products in embargoed countries\u2019 weapons systems is a \u201cclear breach\u201d of conditions of sale for its customers and distributors. \u201cWe investigate any infringement of this policy very thoroughly and will take legal action in case of infringement,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

Asked about Alabuga, u-blox said it is in regular contact with government officials and several NGO representatives.<\/p>\n

Regarding how u-blox parts were found in drones used by Russia, the spokesperson said there are several likely explanations, including that the components were purchased before sanctions were in place, that they were part of excess inventory sold by customers to brokers in countries not sanctioning Russia and then shipped into Russia, that they were smuggled into Russia, or that they were removed from products such e-scooters, e-bikes, cars and construction machines and put into Russian drones.<\/p>\n

Dutch company NXP Semiconductors also sent VOA a statement on Friday, saying it is \u201ccommitted\u201d to complying with the law and \u201cworking diligently to ensure its products are not improperly diverted to embargoed countries including Russia, Iran and Belarus for use in weapons and other systems for which they were not designed or intended.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOur team is in ongoing contact with regulators around the world on this issue, working within an industry-wide effort to prevent illegal chip diversion,\u201d the company added, referring to an initiative of the Semiconductor Industry Association, of which it is a member.<\/p>\n

TE Connectivity and STMicroelectronics did not respond to VOA requests for comment emailed on Friday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VOA \u2014 WASHINGTON \u2014 U.S. and Ukrainian researchers say Western nations are making progress in trying to curb illicit transfers of Western electronic components to a Russian facility suspected of making Iranian-designed attack drones, but that more needs to be done. The White House released a U.S. intelligence finding June 8 asserting Russia was receiving […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":115180,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-115179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-recposts"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"en","enabled_languages":["fa","en"],"languages":{"fa":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"en":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115179"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":115182,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115179\/revisions\/115182"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/115180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/PERSIAN-HERITAGE.COM\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}