Zelensky urges US and Musk to lift Starlink restrictions and be on 'right side of history'
The Ukrainian president says restrictions are still in place and making it difficult to stop Russian attacks.
A crucial US satellite internet service is still operating too slowly and affecting Ukraine's ability to stop Russian attacks, President Volodymyr Zelensky has said.
"We are counting on these restrictions being lifted. The protection of lives and Ukraine's energy infrastructure ahead of winter directly depends on this," he said.
The issue over the speed of the Starshield system - a military military-grade Starlink service owned by Elon Musk and provided to Ukraine by the US government - has been rumbling on for weeks.
Zelensky said he had asked officials "to work as closely as possible" with the US government and Musk's company. "It is important to be on the right side of history," he said.
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Ukraine uses the normal Starlink service for communications on the battlefield, while Starshield is used for the interception of missiles and drones in Ukraine airspace.
The issue of speed restrictions was first identified in October. It led to conflicting accounts by both Elon Musk and US President Donald Trump.
Musk said the US government was responsible as Starshield was controlled by them, but Trump denied being responsible and said he had told the billionaire owner to "put it back".
It appeared to be returning to normal after a week, following which Ukraine said the restrictions were still being implemented.
The connection issues coincided with a tense diplomatic stand-off between Zelensky and Trump over Ukrainian strikes on oil infrastructure within Russia.
Trump said the strikes on Russian oil refineries, which Kyiv says are crucial to stemming the main revenue source for Moscow's war effort, had pushed global prices higher.
On Sunday Zelensky said Ukraine was struggling to intercept Russian jet-powered drones targeting Ukrainian electricity substations because "restrictions on the operating speed of Starshield terminals along the front line and in the temporarily occupied territories are still there".
"Our interceptor drones lose connection with their operators at a speed of 161km/h (100mph) and simply cannot catch up with Russian jet-powered 'shaheds'," he posted, referring to the drones that follow an Iranian design.
Ukraine has also been beset by a shortage of US-made Patriot interceptors used to defend against Russian missiles - a situation that Russia has exploited to intensify strikes on Ukrainian targets.
Overnight and into Sunday morning Russia hit energy infrastructure in Zaporizhzhia and the Sumy, Odesa, Zhytomyr, and Kirovohrad regions, Ukraine said.
It also struck railway infrastructure in the Dnipro, Kharkiv, and Zaporizhzhia regions.
Scores of people are said to have been hurt in those attacks, as well as two in the Donetsk and Kyiv regions.
Two people were killed in an attack on an infrastructure facility in Chernihiv Region's Mena, governor Vyacheslav Chaus said.
Multiple strikes were also delivered on energy facilities across the region, he added on Telegram.
Ukraine meanwhile said it had carried out strikes on a petrochemical plant and an oil refinery in the central Russian city of Nizhnekamsk.
"On the night of November 15, units of Ukraine's Defence Forces reached Nizhnekamsk in Tatarstan," the military said on Telegram.
"Two enterprises that feed the Russian war with raw materials and fuel came under attack."
Other Ukrainian strikes killed one person in Taganrog, an industrial port city near the border, regional governor Yuri Slyusar said.
In the occupied Luhansk region a lorry driver and an elderly woman were also killed, Leonid Pasechnik, the regional leader installed by Moscow said.
Meanwhile Estonia has announced it will shut its border crossing points with Russia from 1 December following a suspected sabotage attack on a defence company.
Eight people were detained over an attempted arson attack on drone maker Threod Systems.
The Estonian authorities say they had been ordered by Russia's GRU military intelligence service to try and carry out the attack. Russia has not commented.
"Russia must understand that hostile actions against Estonia come with consequences," Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said.
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