Zelenskyy: Starshield speed restrictions remain across the entire front line
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said speed restrictions on the US Starshield military satellite communications system remain in place along the whole front line. He said they hinder the interception of jet-powered drones, while Russia struck a Kyiv hospital overnight.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday that speed restrictions on the US Starshield satellite communications system remain in force along the entire front line and in Ukraine's temporarily occupied territories. In his view, this hampers the Ukrainian military's operations and makes it harder to intercept jet-powered drones. He added that the situation sends Russia a signal that the United States might treat occupied Ukrainian land differently.
Starshield is the military version of Starlink, provided by Elon Musk's company SpaceX. Ukrainian officials said in mid-October that the company had abruptly capped the speed of both systems, at a time of tension with the US over Ukrainian attacks on Russian oil refineries. Service was restored on 24 October. On Thursday Zelenskyy said Ukrainian units had logged disruptions over several days. He called on the defence and foreign ministries to work through the issue with relevant US structures.
Attacks and other developments
After Zelenskyy's remarks, Russia hit the National Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics in central Kyiv with a drone at 3am, close to several Western embassies. Three people were injured. Russia, for its part, claimed it had shot down nearly 1,200 Ukrainian drones overnight and said at least four people were killed in the Volgograd region.
On Friday, Russian strikes killed one person and injured more than 50 in Zaporizhzhia, and killed two people in Odesa. The EU's foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, speaking in Dublin, warned against walking into Russia's traps, saying Moscow was trying to open a debate on European security to divert attention from its aggression.
In Moscow, a car bomb severely injured Sergei Zavorotniy, 72, a former aide to Mykola Azarov, Ukraine's exiled former prime minister. A day earlier, a blast in St Petersburg killed a senior Russian military official. Serhiy Duka, a general in Ukraine's SBU security service suspected in a corruption case, was released on Friday after posting $1.2m bail.
