MOSCOW, January 24. /TASS/. Russia’s forces are employing Orlan-10 drones to detect Ukrainian troops and foreign mercenaries using their cell phones, the Russian Defense Ministry said.

According to the ministry, the drones can offer cellular connection and suppress it randomly, as well as transmit the exact coordinates of several thousand cell phones in use by the enemy.

"This is how one of our missions goes. We fly [a drone] to a designated area looking for cellular subscribers. We identify their location, send them texts and figure out what country they belong to," a commander with the call sign "Stary" (or Old Man) said on a video released by the Defense Ministry. "For instance, we detect an object during the course of the special military operation. It belongs to the Czech Republic. We provide its coordinates to the center, we hit it and our intelligence confirms that it was a group of mercenaries. The target is destroyed," he added.

According to the Russian Defense Ministry, units equipped with Orlan-10 drones made it possible to prevent several militant attacks. The UAV’s equipment is capable of detecting whether a target cell phone is simply turned on. In addition, the drones are also engaged in the important mission of sending warning messages to civilians.