Iranian drone ‘Mohajer 10’ being exhibited during the Defense Industry Fair in Tehran, Iran on August 23, 2023. (Photo by Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Shunned by the West, Russia has attracted just a handful of foreign nations to display their military wares at an arms show this week, including one nation for whom the Kremlin has become an increasingly loyal customer: Iran.

Tehran is displaying its wares at its own pavilion at the Army-2024 show outside Moscow, including its Mohajer-10 drone, according to state media, a long-range drone Tehran says is among the most advanced unmanned aerial vehicle in its fleet. The Mohajer-10, which shares the basic airframe shape as the the US-made Reaper, was first unveiled in 2023 at an exposition in Iran, and can purportedly fly up to 24,000 feet, with a range up to 1,100 miles and a 24-hour flight duration.

Iranian state-run media paraphrased Iranian ambassador to Russia, Kazem Jalali, as saying that “officials in many countries are envious of the Iranian progress when they visit” the pavilion. Jalali maintained that his country’s military relationship to Russia could be harmful to other nations, saying, “[We] do not consider our cooperation with Russia against any country or region.”

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Such a declaration would likely raise eyebrows in Kyiv, as Western nations have provided extensive evidence that Russia has used Iranian drones, especially smaller one-way-attack UAVs like in the Shahed family, to strike military and civilian targets alike there. The US Defense Intelligence Agency previously said a different member of the Mohajer family, Mohajer-6, has been spotted in Ukraine, “easily identified by its distinctive tail…”

While Iranian reports say the Islamic Republic is also showing off radar and other technology, including electronic warfare systems, at the Russian exhibition, it has promoted itself as an alternate source of relatively cheap but effective drones. After Iran launched a drone and missile barrage at Israel in April in response for the purported killing by Israel of Iranian military officials in Syria, experts told Breaking Defense that it was a display likely to attract foreign customers, even if the attack itself was ineffective.

“Iran is one of the few countries that has a combat-proven, well-working system in that category [of] longer range attack suicide drone …” Fabian Hinz, a research fellow for Defence and Military Analysis at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, told Breaking Defense in April. “There’s not a lot [of that in the] market, there are a few other companies there are some Chinese companies now building very similar systems to the Shahed but short of the original system.”

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Russian media said that 83 nations have sent delegations to the show, but only three nations besides Russia and Iran are displaying military tech: Belarus, India and China. The exposition is scheduled to end today.

The gathering also comes as the Middle East warily awaits a response by Iran and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah, for purported Israeli strikes in Beirut and Tehran nearly two week ago.

In a Monday joint statement, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the US said that they discussed the situation in the Middle East, urging “Iran to stand down its ongoing threats of a military attack against Israel and discussed the serious consequences for regional security should such an attack take place.”

Tim Martin contributed reporting from Belfast.