Ukraine’s president has told airlines that Russian airspace will be “effectively closing” as his country escalates its drone strikes.
“We want to warn every airline that uses Russian airspace, every insurer, everyone who still uses key Russian airports: the Russian sky is becoming completely dangerous,” Volodymyr Zelensky said. Ukraine has since formally notified the UN of the risks to civilian aviation.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said the comments amounted to a “declaration of state terrorism”.
Most Western commercial airlines do not fly over Russia because of the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, but carriers in countries like Turkey and China do.
Explaining the elevated airspace risk in his nightly video address on Tuesday, Zelensky said that “Ukraine does not threaten civilian aviation as such – not a single civilian aircraft” and did not want the loss of innocent lives.
“There will simply be drones in Russia’s skies on a scale that has to be taken into account,” he said.
Zelensky directed the warning to airlines continuing to operate flights to Russian airports, especially in major cities like St Petersburg and Moscow.
In a statement on X, Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said that Ukraine had officially notified the International Civil Aviation Organization that Russian airspace was not safe for civilian aviation.
“We want to prevent unintended incidents,” he said, adding: “The war is returning home to Russia.”
On Wednesday afternoon, flight tracking website FlightRadar24 showed many planes flying over Russia, including arriving and departing from the two main airports.
Credit: bbc.com
