Trump asked Musk to suspend Starlink limitations in Ukraine

O president of the United States, Donald Trump, telephoned SpaceX owner Elon Musk, asking him to suspend the limitations to the military version of the Starlink satellite system in Ukraine, today reported The Wall Street Journal.

According to the newspaper, which cites US officials, Trump expressed frustration with the speed limit imposed on Ukrainian network equipment — which lost connection by over 100 miles per hour — which, in turn, undermined the effectiveness of the attack drones and Ukrainian interceptors in the face of the Russian offensives.

Official sources from Washington and Kiev indicated to the newspaper that the service began to function more normally today after the conversation; however, some Ukrainian representatives pointed out that the system still does not work with total normality.

The call happened after the same newspaper claimed that Musk ordered a reduction in service speed, in the midst of contradictory versions between SpaceX and the White House about whether the tycoon acted on his own or at the request of the US government.

Trump today highlighted the importance of Musk, having “reestablished” the full functionality of the Starlink service.

“I don’t want to go into details,” Trump said when questioned by the press at the White House about the alleged phone call made to Musk. Trump merely said that his relationship with the businessman in the technological sector “is very good”.

“ The truth is, whether I called him or someone else makes no difference. In the end, what matters is that he restored the service,” the American President added.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed on Tuesday the re-establishment of early U.S. alerts aimed at detecting Russian missiles, another problem that Ukrainian forces have complained about in recent weeks, marked by Trump's criticism of Kiev.

The capital of Ukraine was the subject of a new missile attack last night, following negotiations between Russia and the United States on Wednesday in St. Petersburg to end the conflict.

A few hours after the negotiations, and Trump declared that the end of the war was never “so near”, a missile attack against Kiev left six wounded, according to the mayor of the Ukrainian capital, Vitali Klitschko.

The Ukrainian army issued an alert overnight for ballistic missiles from eastern Russia.

Steve Witkoff, sent by Trump, met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St Petersburg following a meeting on the eve in Oslo with European leaders and Zelensky, who called for a cessation of fighting in current positions as a first step towards negotiations.

The Kremlin’s diplomatic adviser, Iuri Ushakov, indicated at the end of a “detailed and frank” meeting over three hours that Moscow is ready to resume negotiations on three with Kiev and Washington, but not immediately, “about 10 November.”.

That is to say, after the mid-term elections in the United States, which could change the American political landscape, and without a break in the fighting until then, which continue without significant progress on either side.

Volodymyr Zelensky said he was in favour of a three-way meeting, “as soon as possible”. “The agenda is clear: putting an end to war, promoting peace and, if I understood correctly, preparing everything for a meeting at the level of leaders,” he said.

On the contrary, Ushakov stated on Wednesday that the proposals put forward by Kiev and the Europeans in Oslo “do not contain much”.

Russia demands, inter alia, that the Ukrainian army withdraw from the territories it still controls in the Donetsk region (east of Ukraine), which Kiev considers unacceptable.

Witkoff also noted the distance between the belligerent parties, considering in social network X that discussions with Putin had been “constructive and would continue in the framework of trilateral talks”, but recognizing that there was still “a lot of work to do”.

Ushakov also referred to a possible meeting that is being prepared between Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Xi Jinping in China, on the edge of the APEC summit in Shenzhen in November, but the White House has not yet confirmed the US President's visit to the Chinese city.