Drone shot down by Russian air defense near Kmeimim
QAMISHLI, Syria (North Press) – On Monday,Russian air defenses shot down a drone near the Russian Khmeimim Air Base in Latakia countryside, Syria’s coast, Russian media said.
“The air defenses shot down a drone while trying to approach the base from the northeastern side,” Sputnik News Agency cited a source at the Khmeimim base.
The source accused the Syrian armed factions, stationed in the countryside between Latakia and Idlib, of launching a drone towards the Russian base, adding that “the Russian air defenses shot it down before it reached the base ground, without recording any damage.”
On September 27 a drone, launched by armed factions in Idlib, was shot down by Russian air defenses in Khmeimim base, according to the Russian Reconciliation Center in Syria.
On August 12, the commander of the Russian soldiers in Syria, Lieutenant General Yevgeny Nikiforov, revealed that the Russian pilots performed out more than 100,000 combat sorties in Syria from Kmeimim base, since Russia intervened in the Syrian civil war in September 2015.
It is worth mentioning that Russia has a naval facility in Tartous, which is Russia’s only naval foothold in the Mediterranean, and has been using it since the times of the Soviet Union.