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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he has repeatedly pressed U.S. President Donald Trump to impose sanctions on Russian and Chinese companies developing Rassvet, a satellite internet network Moscow is building with Beijing's support as a potential rival to Elon Musk's Starlink.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Zelenskyy said Russia accelerated development of the system after its troops began making unauthorized use of SpaceX's Starlink network for military purposes.
He said the project could become operational as soon as "the end of the year, beginning next year."
Zelenskyy said Chinese firms are assisting Moscow's effort to field a Starlink-style system of its own.
"We know that China works on satellites, works on the possibility of helping Russia with a similar Starlink," he said.
The Ukrainian leader said he has raised the matter with Trump on multiple occasions, most recently during a meeting in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, and has asked Washington to sanction the companies involved in the project's development.
Rassvet is being developed by the Russian firm Bureau 1440 as a domestic alternative to Starlink, which Ukrainian forces have relied on heavily for battlefield communications and drone operations since Russia's full-scale invasion began.
Starlink has also played a role on the Russian side of the front line, where troops have at times used unauthorized terminals before SpaceX moved to block that access, prompting Moscow to pursue its own network.
Zelenskyy's comments add a diplomatic dimension to a program that has drawn growing attention from Ukrainian and Western officials over the course of the year, as Moscow has moved from early testing toward deploying a larger constellation of satellites.
Zelenskyy's remarks follow separate warnings from other quarters about the military risk posed by a functioning Russian satellite network.
The German Armed Forces have cautioned about the potential threat from the Starlink alternative Russia is seeking to build. Separately, Finnish President Alexander Stubb approached Musk about expanding Starlink's satellite internet coverage over Ukraine to support strikes on Russian ballistic missile launchers, according to prior reporting.
Neither the White House nor SpaceX has publicly responded to Zelenskyy's sanctions request, and it remains unclear whether the Trump administration intends to act on it.
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