Ukraine sends drone experts to three countries in Middle East, Zelenskiy says

By Yuliia Dysa and Max ‌Hunder

KYIV, March 10 (Reuters) - ​Ukraine has ​sent air defence teams to Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia to help them in their fight against Iran's aerial attacks, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy ‌said on Tuesday.

Gulf states have expended large quantities of precious air-defence missiles ⁠to counter Iran’s attack drones and have sought Ukraine's expertise in downing them. Kyiv downs Russian drones every ‌night using an array of weaponry ‌including cheaper, smaller drones or jamming equipment.

"Regarding the situation in the Middle East, we have sent our teams: three professional, equipped teams," Zelenskiy told reporters. He did not give ​details on the teams but said they should all be in place this week.

His communications adviser also said Ukrainian specialists had already been deployed to a U.S. military base ⁠in Jordan, without providing details.

Zelenskiy said the presence of Ukrainian pilots was key to the effectiveness of interceptor drone operations.

"Even ​those countries that were quietly buying interceptors have, I think, realised that without our military, our operators, our software... without all of that, the ​interceptors simply don't work."

KYIV LEVERAGING EXPERIENCE

Since the U.S. and ‌Israel began airstrikes on Iran on February 28, Ukraine has sought to leverage its long experience of countering Russia's Iranian-designed Shahed attack drones.

Kyiv ⁠says Russia - which now manufactures them itself - has launched more than 57,000 Shahed-type drones at Ukraine so far.

Reuters reported last week that the U.S. and Qatar were looking to buy interceptor drones from Ukraine ⁠as a much cheaper alternative to missiles for downing Shaheds.

Asked what Kyiv would get in return for the ​deployment of the specialist teams, Zelenskiy said Ukraine was seeking air defence missiles above all else.

Kyiv has complained for months of critical shortages of those munitions, particularly for the U.S.-made Patriot systems which are the ‌Ukraine's only effective tool to intercept ballistic missiles.

The Iran war has delayed a fresh round of peace talks brokered by Washington between Russia ‌and Ukraine.

Zelenskiy told reporters on Tuesday the next trilateral meeting had been postponed to next week, adding ⁠that he wanted more swaps of ‌prisoners of war and discussion ​of a possible meeting between himself, U.S. President Donald Trump and Russia's Vladimir Putin.

(Reporting by Max Hunder and Yuliia Dysa, editing by Alexandra Hudson and ‌Gareth Jones)

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