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Ukraine has carried out an assassination of a top Russian colonel near Moscow, in a major blow to Vladimir Putin's army. Alexey Kolomeytsev was killed in Kolomna on Friday by a local

resistance group working in tandem with Ukraine's military intelligence, the GUR - according to reports. The 51-year-old was head of a military unit that trained up Shahed drone

operatives. The Iranian-produced drones have been used repeatedly to attack energy infrastructure and residential areas in Ukraine throughout the war. Ukraine's military intelligence

later confirmed the death of the Russian colonel in a statement to its Telegram channel. "On September 27, 2024, in the city of Kolomna, Moscow region of the Russian Federation, Colonel

of the Russian occupation army Alexey Vladimirovich Kolomeytsev was killed," they said. "The 51-year-old Kolomeytsev headed the 924th state centre (military unit 20924) of

unmanned aviation of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, which trains specialists in the combat use of drones, in particular, 'shaheds', as well as UAV maintenance

personnel "The occupier is directly involved in the full-scale invasion of Russia and the commission of war crimes against Ukraine.” Shaheds are often used to overwhelm Ukrainian air

defences, to allow successful missile strikes, and are launched in mass waves. Their flying range varies from 1,000 kilometres (about 620 miles) to 2,500 kilometres (about 1,550 miles). They

are said to weigh about 200 kilograms with a maximum flight speed of about 185 kilometres (115 miles) per hour. Russia has obtained a licence from Iran to produce its own version of the

Shahed drone and is stepping up production. Major General Vadym Skibitskyi, the deputy head of Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) at the time, told the BBC in January that

Moscow hopes to produce up to 350 Shaheds a month. The drones are being produced at a huge manufacturing plant owned by a company called JSC Alabuga in Tartarstan. The plant plans to deliver

6,000 drones to the army by September 2025 in a three-stage arrangement. However, data on Russian launches of Shahed drones collected by the Ukrainian military indicate that Alabuga is

ahead of its production schedule and has already supplied approximately 4500 of the promised 6000 drones as of late April 2024.