{"id":641995,"date":"2026-10-26T17:36:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-26T17:36:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/641995\/"},"modified":"2026-10-26T17:36:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-26T17:36:16","slug":"ukraine-disputes-musks-claim-its-military-breached-starlinks-terms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/641995\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine disputes Musk’s claim its military breached Starlink’s terms"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ukrainian officials have disputed claims by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk that the country\u2019s military violated Starlink\u2019s terms of service<\/a> by using the civilian satellite internet network for offensive drone strikes.<\/p>\n

Serhii Beskrestnov, a defence technology adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky, said long-standing restrictions on the civilian system in Ukraine made such offensive use impossible.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very strange that Elon Musk doesn\u2019t know about the restrictions on Starlink\u2019s operation in Ukraine,\u201d he wrote in an online post.<\/p>\n

SpaceX\u2019s Starlink and its military-focused Starshield service are critical to Ukraine\u2019s wartime connectivity. Earlier this month, Ukrainian drones connected to Starshield lost connectivity at high speeds, disrupting air defences during daily Russian air attacks. Officials said the so-called speed caps were lifted on Saturday, and the service was restored.<\/p>\n

Still, questions have persisted about who ordered the interruptions to satellite internet system that Kyiv has relied on for years to counter Moscow\u2019s attacks.<\/p>\n

Writing on Telegram, Beskrestnov said that drones operated via the civilian Starlink system had a speed restriction of 70\u201390 km\/h within Ukraine and did not work in Russia.<\/p>\n

\u201cTherefore, we physically cannot use commercial Starlink for deep strikes or medium-range strikes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Musk acknowledged on Saturday that SpaceX had throttled Starlink in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\u201cUsing Starlink, a civilian commercial service, for offensive drone strikes to kill people has never been allowed, nor should it be,\u201d Musk wrote. <\/p>\n

\u201cUkraine military violated Starlink terms of service and used it for offensive drone strikes to kill people. That loophole was closed last week.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he maintained that the US government controlled whatever changes happened with Starshield, the military-grade version of Starlink that is the backbone of Ukraine\u2019s drone operations and communication. US President Donald Trump has maintained that he didn’t make that call, while Vice President JD Vance has hinted at White House coordination with Musk.<\/p>\n

Restrictions imposed last week on Starshield alarmed the Ukrainian military and government officials, with commanders reporting lost drones and disrupted missions. They also added to tensions between Kyiv and Washington, a relationship already strained by Trump\u2019s reported deal with Moscow to import diesel from Russia that Ukraine viewed as a betrayal.<\/p>\n

\"Serhii<\/p>\n

Serhii Beskrestnov, also known as “Flash”, an adviser to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks during an interview in Kyiv, Ukraine (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n

The US is making new efforts to end the war<\/p>\n

The restoration of Starlink service followed a new US diplomatic push to end the war. Russia agreed Wednesday to resume three-way negotiations with Washington and Kyiv next month. On Friday, Kyiv and Moscow also agreed to a localised ceasefire brokered by first lady Melania Trump around Oleshky, a war-ravaged, Russian-occupied town in Ukraine\u2019s southern Kherson region.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Zelensky on Sunday said Russia had launched nearly 2,300 drones targeting Ukrainian cities over the past week, renewing his call on Western allies to speed up deliveries of interceptors.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis week alone, Russia has launched about 1,600 guided bombs, 48 missiles of various types, including ballistic missiles, and almost 2,300 strike drones at Ukraine,\u201d Zelensky wrote in an online post.<\/p>\n

He said the attacks \u2014 many of them deadly \u2014 had affected nine regions of the country, damaging power plants, grain stores, civilian homes and commercial facilities.<\/p>\n

\"Ukrainian<\/p>\n

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke out against Trump’s decision. (Source: Associated Press)<\/p>\n

More civilian deaths in Ukraine and Russia<\/p>\n

Russia launched more than 20 attacks on Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region overnight into Sunday, using drones and an aerial bomb, according to local authorities. Three people died at the scene and a fourth man later died in hospital, regional military administration head Oleksandr Hanzha reported, while over a dozen people were injured.<\/p>\n

In Vinnytsia, a city in central Ukraine, at least six people were injured when a Russian drone struck a residential building, according to the state emergency service. The attack also damaged a nearby care home, with emergency crews evacuating 15 elderly residents, the service said.<\/p>\n

Also according to the emergency service, consecutive Russian strikes on a shopping centre in Kharkiv injured four people late on 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 once rescuers arrive on the scene.<\/p>\n

Russia’s Defense Ministry on Sunday claimed its forces targeted multiple sites in and around Kharkiv, including a shopping and logistics centre, that it said had stored dual-use goods meant for the Ukrainian military.<\/p>\n

In Russia, two people were killed and 13 others injured in Belgorod, a city 40 km from the Ukrainian border, following \u201cmass\u201d nighttime drone strikes by Kyiv, regional Gov. Alexander Shuvayev reported on Sunday.<\/p>\n

In the Russian city of Oryol, body of a fourth victim was pulled from the rubble the day after a Ukrainian strike on an industrial plant, local Gov. Andrey Klychkov reported. On Saturday, local authorities said three people had been killed in the attack.<\/p>\n

Ukraine’s General Staff that day said its forces hit an electronics plant in Oryol that makes components for the cruise and ballistic missiles Russia fires at Ukrainian cities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukrainian officials have disputed claims by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk that the country\u2019s military violated Starlink\u2019s terms of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":641996,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,1979,145,40,38,41,39,1745],"class_list":["post-641995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-russia-invades-ukraine","tag-technology","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-uk-europe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641995\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}