Ukrainian prankster infiltrates Russian Industry and Trade Ministry drone meeting, hears official say 90% of electrical components are foreign

A Ukrainian prankster infiltrated a private Russian Industry and Trade Ministry meeting held by video conference. Yevhen Volnov published the video on April 17; the Telegram channel Astra drew attention to it and identified several of the participants.

The edited recording, just over a minute long, shows that the meeting concerned drone production, as indicated by a presentation visible to participants on the video call.

One female participant says off camera that her company had run into a “raw materials problem” affecting battery production. She asks what percentage of raw materials in the finished products should be foreign-made.

Russia simply cannot source materials available in other countries, she says. “Even if we’re talking about copper wire — which, as everyone knows, I think our colleagues will back me up on this — is made exclusively in China. So if you’re just looking at electrical components, 90 percent of what we use has always been foreign raw materials. It’s just not made in Russia,” she adds.

Note: This article contains explicit language. The following paragraph describes what the prankster said to meeting participants.

In the second part of the video, Volnov asks: “Colleagues, can you hear me?” He then hurls a vulgar insult at the participants and their mothers. When one bald official asks for Volnov to be removed from the call, the prankster adds: “All your ugly fucking faces are on camera now, so gentlemen, watch your backs. Yeah, you, baldy — you first.”

According to Volnov and the Telegram channel Astra, the meeting was attended by Alexei Serdyuk, head of the Industry and Trade Ministry’s unmanned systems and robotics department — the official Volnov called baldy. Also present were:

• Alexander Plotnikov, a staff member of the same drone department;
• Daniil Abulov, who works on supporting drone manufacturers in their dealings with the Defense Ministry and public organizations;
• Alexander Lysenko, an Industry and Trade Ministry employee;
• Andrei Titov, who is connected to defense industry enterprises;
• Andrei Sukharev, also connected to the defense industry;
• Aisen Nesterov, director of asset protection at the Center for Unmanned Systems and Technologies.

The Industry and Trade Ministry has not commented on the leak.

Russia makes extensive use of foreign components in its weapons production. The multipurpose Orlan-10 drone used an engine from Japan, a control system based on a microcontroller from Switzerland, and a camera gimbal with equipment from the United States, according to data from the British Royal United Services Institute (RUSI). The drone’s manufacturer procures foreign components through intermediary firms in the United States, China, and Russia, investigators found in a 2022 investigation.

The Shahed attack drones produced in Tatarstan use 126 components manufactured in other countries — primarily the United States — and only four made in Russia, The Washington Post found in 2023.