2008 Georgian drone shootdowns
2008 Georgian drone shootdowns refers to several incidents in March, April and May 2008, when Georgia's pro-Russian breakaway region of Abkhazia claimed to have shot down unmanned Georgian reconnaissance aircraft. Georgia initially denied that any of these downings took place, but made the allegations public following the April 20 shootdown carried out by a fighter jet belonging to the Russian Air Force. Involvement of the Russian military was denied by the Abkhaz separatists and Russia, with both falsely claiming that the separatists alone had accomplished the task. However, Russian military involvement was later confirmed by a UNOMIG fact finding mission which represented its results on May 26. On June 1, in a note sent to the Russian delegation at the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Georgia recognised that two other downings of its drones had taken place in the past.
2008 Georgian spy plane shootdowns | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Part of Georgian-Abkhazian conflict | |||||||
| |||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
Abkhazian military Russian military | Georgian Air Force | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Colonel David Nairashvili | |||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
None | 3-7 drones shot down |