On Saturday, Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy stepped up his criticism of SpaceX, stating that velocity caps on its defense-grade Starshield satellite equipment carried risky geopolitical results and weakened essential aerial defenses.
Zelenskyy further stated that Starshield terminal operations in temporarily Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine had been restricted to a maximum speed of 161 kph for the past five days impeding Ukraine’s defense capacity.
Zelenskyy told reporters in his remarks, stating, “The restrictions have now been in place for five days. They say it is some kind of technical issue. We do not believe that is the case.”
“If you impose restrictions there, you are already partially recognising the temporarily occupied territories as not ours. And that is why I believe we have the right to raise this issue and restore the speed – so that there are no restrictions at all.”
According to Zelenskyy, the speed limitations made it difficult for Ukrainian air defence teams to stop Russian jet-propelled drones and put Ukrainian cities at greater risk. Nonetheless, Ukrainian officials said that SpaceX restricted the speed of Starlink and its Starshield communication systems to about 160 kph in the wake of the US President Donald Trump’s administration following Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil refineries, and operations resumed on October 24.
