A Russian operative positioned within five kilometers of central Kyiv may have helped guide the Shahed drone that struck the headquarters of Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) on Friday, according to a Ukrainian electronic warfare expert and presidential adviser. Serhii “Flash” Beskrestnov said he believes the drone may have been controlled in real time through a portable Mesh radio repeater connected to the internet and briefly activated near the target.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. “My personal opinion: the Shahed was controlled and guided online via a Mesh radio repeater with internet access, which a Russian agent switched on somewhere nearby – within 5 km – for a short period during the attack,” Beskrestnov said. He added that such a repeater could be roughly half the size of a school backpack, making it relatively easy to transport and activate temporarily. Beskrestnov also pointed to the fact that no other Shahed drones were in the air at the time of the strike. In his assessment, that meant the aircraft could not have been controlled through a relay chain involving other drones stretching back toward Russian-controlled territory. His account has not been independently verified, and Ukrainian authorities have not announced the identification or detention of an operative suspected of helping guide the drone. If confirmed, however, the assessment would raise fresh concerns about Russia’s ability to combine long-range drone attacks with covert activity inside Ukraine to improve the precision of strikes against sensitive targets.