Skip to content 
Ukrainian officials have disputed claims by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk that the country’s military violated Starlink’s terms of service by using the civilian satellite Internet network for offensive drone attacks.
Serhii Beskrestnov, a defense technology adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said longstanding restrictions on the civilian system in Ukraine made such offensive use impossible.
“It is very strange that Elon Musk does not know about the restrictions on Starlink’s operation in Ukraine,” he wrote in an online post.
SpaceX’s Starlink and its military-focused Starshield service are critical to Ukraine’s wartime connectivity. Earlier this month, Ukrainian drones linked to Starshield lost connectivity at high speed, disrupting air defenses during daily Russian airstrikes. Officials said the so-called speed caps were lifted on Saturday, and service was restored.
Still, questions persist about who ordered the disruptions to the satellite Internet system that Kiev has relied on for years to fight Moscow’s attacks.
Writing on Telegram, Beskrestnov said that drones operated via the civilian Starlink system have a speed limit of 70 to 90 km/h within Ukraine and cannot operate in Russia.
Serhii Beskrestnov, also known as Flash, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, says it would not be possible for the Ukrainian military to use Starlink for offensive drone attacks.(Efrem Lukatsky/Associated Press)
“That’s why we physically cannot use commercial Starlink for deep strike or medium strike,” he said.
Musk acknowledged on Saturday that SpaceX had stopped Starlink in Ukraine.
“Using Starlink, a civilian commercial service, to launch offensive drones to kill people has never been allowed, nor should it be,” Musk wrote. “The Ukrainian military violated Starlink’s terms of service and used it for offensive drone strikes to kill people. That loophole was closed last week.”
But he claimed that the US government controls whatever changes have happened with Starshield, the military version of Starlink, which is the backbone of Ukraine’s drone operations and communications.
US President Donald Trump claimed he did not make that call, while Vice President JD Vance hinted at White House coordination with Musk.
Restrictions imposed on Starshield last week have alarmed Ukrainian military and government officials, with commanders reporting lost drones and disrupted missions.
They also added to tensions between Kiev and Washington, a relationship already strained by Trump’s reported deal with Moscow to import diesel from Russia, which Ukraine viewed as a betrayal.
New push to end war
The restoration of Starlink service follows a new US diplomatic push to end the war. Russia agreed on Wednesday to resume three-way talks with Washington and Kiev next month.
On Friday, Kiev and Moscow also agreed to a localized ceasefire brokered by efforts by first lady Melania Trump and Pope Leo around Oleshky, a war-torn, Russian-occupied town in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region.
Meanwhile, Zelenskyy said on Sunday that Russia had launched nearly 2,300 drones targeting Ukrainian cities in the past week, renewing his call for Western allies to speed up deliveries of interceptors.
He said the attacks – many of them deadly – affected nine regions of the country, damaging power plants, grain stores, civilian homes and commercial facilities.
Prime Minister Mark Carney says he is concerned about the reported shutdown of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite system in Ukraine, which has created “real consequences.” He says that Canadians also “don’t want to be caught in a situation where we are dependent on one supplier who can change their view” and compromise Canadian sovereignty.
More civilian deaths
Russia launched more than 20 attacks on Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region overnight on Sunday, using drones and an aerial bomb, according to local authorities. Three people died at the scene and a fourth man died later in hospital, regional military administration chief Oleksandr Hanzha reported, while over a dozen people were injured.
In Vinnytsia, a city in central Ukraine, at least six people were injured when a Russian drone hit a residential building, according to the state emergency service. The attack also damaged a nearby nursing home, with emergency personnel evacuating 15 elderly residents, the service said.
Even after emergency services, consecutive Russian strikes at a shopping center in Kharkiv injured four people late Saturday, including three rescue workers. Ukraine has long accused Russia of so-called double-tap strikes, in which an initial attack is followed by another when rescue services arrive.
Firefighters work on Saturday at the site of the Rocket Strike shopping center in Kharkiv.(Sofia Gatilova/AFP)
The Russian Defense Ministry claimed on Sunday that its forces targeted several sites in and around Kharkiv, including a shopping and logistics center that it said stored dual-use goods intended for the Ukrainian military.
In Russia, two people were killed and 13 others were injured in Belgorod, a city 40 kilometers from the Ukrainian border, after “massive” overnight drone strikes from Kiev, regional governor Alexander Shuvayev reported on Sunday.
In the Russian city of Oryol, the body of a fourth victim was pulled from the rubble the day after a Ukrainian strike on an industrial plant, local governor Andrey Klychkov reported. On Saturday, local authorities said three people were killed in the attack.
The Ukrainian General Staff said that day that its forces hit an electronics plant in Oryol that makes components for the cruise and ballistic missiles that Russia fires at Ukrainian cities.
