Sept. 2 (UPI) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a warning to airlines to stay clear of Russian airspace and airports due to a large-scale escalation in drone strikes on Russian targets by the Ukrainian military.
Zelensky said Tuesday that he wanted to notify every airline flying in Russian airspace, every insurance company and anyone that still used airport hubs such as St. Petersburg and Moscow, which have six airports between them, that the skies above Russia were “becoming completely dangerous.”
“There will simply be drones in Russia’s skies on a scale that has to be taken into account,” he said.
“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine and our other institutions will provide international organizations with full information about the dangers in Russian airspace. Drone-infested skies are no place for civilian aviation,” added Zelensky.
Zelensky stressed that the warning was not intended to “threaten civilian aviation as such — not a single civilian aircraft” and Ukraine did not want the loss of any innocent lives.
The majority of Western airlines stopped over-flying Russia after the start of the war in 2022 but Chinese, Turkish and Middle East carriers and some others continue to do so, particularly on long-haul Asia to Europe flights where the Russia route can slash up to 2,250 miles from the journey, equivalent to four hours’ flight time and as much as 30 tons of extra fuel.
Russian aviation authorities automatically suspend flights if a drone sighting is confirmed within a certain radius of a specified zone with civil aviation disrupted on numerous occasions over the past year after Ukrainian drone assaults, often involving hundreds of drones at a time.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Zelensky’s warning was a “declaration of state terrorism,” vowing that Russia would not let up in its attacks on Ukraine.
On Sunday, the Russian Defense Ministry stoked Ukrainain fears they were facing another very tough coming winter by saying the Russian military was gearing up for “massive strikes” against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure as a “response to the continuing attacks of the Kyiv regime against the Russian civil infrastructure and fuel and energy facilities.”
The defense ministry was referencing a sustained military campaign by Ukraine targeting Russia’s oil processing capabilities and logistics faclilities with long-range drones.
