Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned airlines that Russian airspace will be closed as his country escalates drone attacks.
"We want to warn all airlines that use Russian airspace, all insurers, everyone who still uses key Russian airports: Russian skies are becoming completely dangerous," Volodymyr Zelensky said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin responded by saying Zelensky's comments amounted to a declaration of state terrorism. Russia, he added, would continue its attacks on Ukraine, which have intensified in recent weeks.
Most Western commercial airlines are not flying over Russia in the wake of Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, but carriers in countries like Turkey and China are. Explaining the heightened airspace risk in his evening video address on Tuesday, Zelensky said that “Ukraine does not threaten civil aviation as such – not a single civilian aircraft” and does not want the loss of innocent lives.
"There will simply be drones in the skies of Russia on a scale that must be taken into account," he said.
Zelensky issued a warning to airlines that continue to operate flights to Russian airports, especially in large cities such as St. Petersburg and Moscow.
Ukraine has targeted energy facilities deep inside Russian territory and has carried out repeated attacks on depots belonging to Russia's two largest online retailers, Wildberries and Ozone.
Its drone attacks have led to months of disruptions at some of Russia's largest airports, particularly in Moscow, where at times all four major airports have been forced to halt arrivals and departures.
Several cancellations were reported today, and according to the Russian air defense plan "Kovjor", flights are suspended if a drone is detected in the relevant area.
Aviation risk consultancy Osprey Flight Solutions said in a warning to clients that while the majority of Ukrainian drone and missile attacks are likely to occur within a 300km radius of the border, daily attacks deep inside Russia will almost certainly continue this year.
"There is also a real possibility that the frequency of Ukrainian attacks will continue to increase in the short term deep into Russian territory," the warning added. "It is assessed that miscalculation or misidentification in areas related to the Ukrainian conflict is likely."
Speaking to reporters at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Kyrgyzstan, Putin said: "They are asking us to continue negotiations, but you don't negotiate with terrorists."
His comments come as Russian attacks on Ukraine continue, with heavy airstrikes killing 12 people on Tuesday and further attacks on Odessa, Sumy and Kiev on Wednesday. The Russian military has said it is preparing to launch massive strikes on Ukrainian power plants. The Ukrainian capital and the surrounding region have been under attack for seven days in a row.
A few weeks ago, Zelensky said that Russia was attacking Ukraine every day, and the Ukrainian military had “begun the process of returning the war to Russia.” Over the weekend, he said the same thing, that Russia must feel that the war was “returning to where it came from.”
Chinese, Turkish and Gulf airlines are among those using Russian airspace, with time and fuel savings on routes between Asia and Europe. Other carriers have largely avoided the Eastern European region since Russia's full-scale invasion began in February 2022.
The risks of civil aviation during wartime are clear. A few months after the outbreak of war in eastern Ukraine in 2014 between Russian-backed separatists and the Ukrainian military, a Russian-made missile shot down a passenger plane, killing all 298 people on board. In 2024, Putin apologized to the president of neighboring Azerbaijan for the shooting down of a commercial airliner in Russian airspace, killing 38 people. He said the tragic incident occurred when Russian air defense systems were repelling Ukrainian drones.
