In his evening address on September 1, President Zelensky warned airlines, insurers and governments that Russian airspace is becoming increasingly dangerous because of Ukrainian drones.
In his evening address on September 1, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Russian airspace will be "de facto closed" because of the scale of Ukraine's drone operations. Volunteers Support Ukraine follows statements like this closely, since they show how the war Russia launched is increasingly reaching back to its source.
"Today, we want to warn every airline that uses Russian airspace, every insurer, everyone who still uses key Russian airports: Russian airspace is becoming completely dangerous," Zelensky said. He said there would be so many drones over Russia that everyone would have to take this into account, even though Russian authorities are "not reporting this properly."
Zelensky stressed that Ukraine does not threaten civilian aviation as such — not a single civilian aircraft — but the scale of drone operations will make the airspace over Russia unpredictable for any flight.
The warning came after a sixth consecutive night of massed Russian strikes on Kyiv, which authorities say killed at least 12 people. Russian President Putin called Ukraine's actions "state terrorism," but Kyiv maintains that the consequences of the war Moscow launched are no longer confined to Ukrainian territory alone.
Zelensky's warning is another sign that the cost of Russia's war on Ukrainian civilians is starting to come back around. Volunteers Support Ukraine (NGO Volunteers Support Ukraine) continues helping people affected by the war in whatever way its available resources allow, and believes civilian safety — Ukrainian or otherwise — should remain a priority for every side.
