By Tom Balmforth
NEW YORK, Sept 24 (Reuters) - Finnish President Alexander Stubb said on Thursday he pleaded with SpaceX owner Elon Musk to expand Starlink satellite internet coverage for Ukraine so it can strike Russian ballistic missile launchers located inside Russian territory.
With winter looming, Ukraine has an acute shortage of air defenses to repel Russian ballistic missiles, and Kyiv officials believe that turning on Starlink over Russian territory would help it target the Russian launchers
that fire the missiles.
"That's why ... I plead that Elon Musk would give the Ukrainians the possibility to use Starlink in areas where there are ballistic missile launchers, either in the occupied territory of Ukraine or in Russia for strategic purposes because that would save lives," Stubb said.
The Finnish leader, a staunch ally of Ukraine who also has good relations with US President Donald Trump, made the remark in an interview with Reuters in New York where world leaders have converged for the annual gathering at the United Nations.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy used the event to press hard for ceasefires that would cover strikes on targets related to energy infrastructure and vessels in the Black Sea. Russia has given no public indication it wants to see such arrangements.
Four-and-a-half years since the full-scale Russian invasion, the Ukrainians fear Moscow plans to systematically target and destroy power and heating sites in the depth of winter. Russia's use of ballistic missiles hit record levels this summer.
Only Ukraine's Patriot air defenses are able to intercept such missiles, but ammunition is severely depleted and it is unclear where new supplies could come from.
Musk switched on the Starlink satellite internet service over Ukraine shortly after Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022. It has become the lifeblood of Ukraine's battlefield communications and a tool for piloting drones.
Starlink does not work over Russian territory, but Ukrainian officials believe turning it on for Ukraine's use inside Russia would allow its weapons to strike mobile ballistic launchers located within several hundred kilometres of the border.
Looking ahead to winter, Stubb said there were three things that Ukraine needed.
"One is air defenses and even Starlink would be to a certain extent a good air defense there. And the second one is energy installations for the winter."
"The third one is money. So those are the things that we're working on. We're working on putting up a winter package because I don't see the war ending, you know, before the winter."
Stubb said it was good that US-led peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine had restarted in August with the visits of US envoys to both Moscow and Kyiv.
"I still think that the easiest solution would be to call an unconditional ceasefire, basically stop the killing, as President Trump reiterated in his speech in the UN General Assembly," he said.
Such a step, he continued, would be followed by negotiations on security, territory, reconstruction and compensation and other topics.
The war could be frozen along the line of contact with 30-kilometre buffer zones east and west, he said, adding that the next best option was the idea of the partial ceasefire on energy and grain related targets.
(Reporting by Tom Balmforth; Editing by Howard Goller)
