Drone attacks

It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a drone donning a dildo! A New Mexico sheriff running a mayoral campaign in Albuquerque got “dongcoptered” this week after someone flew a drone with a dildo dangling beneath it next to him while he was on the stage addressing a rally.

Dutch media report that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had helped authorities in the Netherlands to apprehend 24-year-old Abdulkadir Ü. after he discussed plans to use drones in a terror attack on New Year’s Eve in Paris in online chatrooms. The suspected drone terrorist was arrested late last year after the FBI tipped off the Dutch police.

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The investigative team of the website Bellingcat has concluded through open source research that in the assassination attempt of President Maduro, it appears that “two drones attempted to attack a parade at which President Maduro was speaking”, that “both drones likely carried some form of explosive device” and that “one detonated near the parade, the other crashed and then likely detonated, causing a fire” and lastly that “it is not possible to accurately attribute this apparent attack without further information.” In the report, Bellingcat also indicates that the two drones might have been DJI Matrice 600’s.

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The assassination attempt on the President of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, in which allegedly two off-the-shelf commercial drones were used, has pushed the debate about the fast-growing industry and expansion of commercial drone flights while providing security measures against the misuse of the unmanned aerial devices to the foreground. Last weekend’s attack is believed to be the first of its kind targetting a head of state and maybe a sign of things to come. It has led to growing concerns among industry experts and government officials as they have yet to find an effective way to counter the threat of low-cost weaponized drones.

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Venezuela’s president Nicolás Maduro has survived, what officials have called an apparent drone assassination attempt during a speech he was making at a military event. Government officials described drones armed with explosives detonating overhead after they were flown towards Maduro as he spoke to soldiers in Venezuela’s capital Caracas on Saturday afternoon.

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PHOTO: OLGA BALASHOVA/RUSSIAN DEFENCE M/ZUMA PRESS

Last week we reported on the drone attack on the Russian airbase, Khmeimim as well as a naval facility in the city of Tartus on Syria’s western coast. In these attacks, 13 drones had been launched from as far as 35 miles away, according to the Russian defense ministry.

Today we learn that the heavily armed Russian military bases in Syria are ill-equipped to defend themselves against drone attacks from insurgent rebel groups opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

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