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Ukrainian officials have accused SpaceX of throttling Starlink satellite services, disrupting its ability to carry out military operations and leaving Kyiv vulnerable to deadly attacks.

An adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that without warning, services had been limited for terminals travelling over 100mph overnight on Wednesday – effectively limiting Ukraine’s ability to launch drones, which use satellite internet to pilot the craft.

Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, which operates Starlink and its military version, Starshield, has since claimed on X that the United States government and military control all Starshield speeds.

“Any limits on speed or usage are decided by the US military and ultimately [President of the United States],” wrote Musk, a major US defence contractor and former top adviser to US President Donald Trump, after receiving criticism for the disruptions.

The White House has not confirmed or denied Musk’s assertion. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.

Writing on Telegram, Ukrainian defence technology adviser Serhii Beskrestnov said Ukraine was “deprived of one of the few chances to defend itself from Shahed drones”.

He added that frontline logistics and long-distance missions were also disrupted.

Asked about the restriction on the military version of Starlink, Zelenskyy told Piers Morgan Uncensored it was “a big mistake” that “will bring a lot of human losses”.

US Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a member of the armed services and foreign relations committees, wrote on X: “These restrictions on Ukraine’s access to Starshield must stop immediately. Lives are at stake.

“The Pentagon is also required to notify Congress if it pauses or downgrades intelligence sharing with Ukraine. If that happens, Secretary of War [Pete Hegseth] must provide that immediately.”

The suggestion that Musk’s company had throttled Starlink services drew the ire of Poland, which pays for Ukrainian Starlink subscriptions on Kyiv’s behalf.

“Hey Elon Musk, big man, are you playing politics with your products again?” wrote Radoslaw Sikorski, Poland’s foreign minister. “As your European customers, we are watching you.”

The “big man” gibe refers to a public dispute on social media between Musk, Sikorski and United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio in 2025, when the SpaceX boss told Sikorski to “be quiet, small man” on his X platform.

Starlink is a sensitive topic between Sikorski and Musk. The two previously clashed over the technology after the trillionaire said Ukraine’s “entire frontline could collapse” if he switched off Starlink.

Following the dispute in 2025, Musk said “no matter how much I disagree with the Ukraine policy, Starlink will never turn off its terminals.”

At the time he added, “We would never do such a thing or use it as a bargaining chip.”

‘Cannot be a coincidence’

The slowdown comes after Russian ballistic missiles struck Kyiv for the second night in a row, killing at least nine people and damaging electricity and heating infrastructure. Zelenskyy said Ukraine did not receive its usual warnings from Western allies for a second day, without specifying which partners.

Sources have told Reuters and other media that the US has threatened to cut off intelligence for early warning of missile strikes on Ukraine, pressing Kyiv to suspend attacks on Russian oil refineries.

Trump said on Tuesday the US has not stopped sharing intelligence.

Beskrestnov warned that the slowdown “cannot be a coincidence” after Trump struck a deal with President Vladimir Putin to import Russian diesel – despite international sanctions to isolate Moscow.

Speaking to AFP, another Ukrainian official accused Washington of throttling Starlink and helping Russia.

On Saturday, Trump suggested Zelenskyy had not done enough to end the war with Russia, blaming him for high diesel prices in the US.

Last week, Trump lifted sanctions on Russian diesel under pressure to curb fuel prices that have soared since the US war with Iran began as the midterms rapidly approach. He told Kyiv to stop attacking Russian refineries and urged Ukrainians to replace Zelenskyy.

“It’s painful when President Trump chooses one side, not our side,” Zelenskyy said in the interview with Morgan.

The Ukrainian leader explained he was fine with Trump being in the middle between Ukraine and Russia, but “if you are in the middle, you have to stay in the middle.”

Jorge Rodriguez has been removed from OFAC’s sanctions list in latest US push for oil control and bilateral diplomacy.

The United States Department of the Treasury has lifted sanctions on the head of Venezuela’s National Assembly, Jorge Rodriguez, brother of the country’s interim President, Delcy Rodriguez.

The move by US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) comes amid major US-Venezuela energy pacts and other talks with the Latin American country’s government.

The delisting notice was posted on the federal agency’s website on Wednesday, officially removing Jorge Rodriguez’s name from OFAC’s Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) blacklist.

The top lawmaker in the country, Jorge Rodriguez has held the position of National Assembly president since 2021. He was reappointed in January, weeks after the abduction of former President Nicolas Maduro by the US government. He served as vice president under Venezuela’s late President Hugo Chavez, among other posts.

Jorge and Delcy Rodriguez had been sanctioned under US President Donald Trump’s first administration due to their ministerial roles under Maduro, who now faces several federal charges, including a sweeping superseding indictment adding torture to his other alleged crimes.

In 2018, the State Department said that Jorge Rodriguez was given prominent government positions by Maduro “to help him maintain power and solidify his authoritarian rule”.

A source familiar with the matter told Al Jazeera that the decision to lift sanctions on Jorge Rodriguez is part of Washington’s wider diplomatic recognition of the interim Venezuelan government, and Trump’s three-phase plan for Venezuela’s stabilisation and political transition.

During a press briefing at the US State Department on Friday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters that the next round of negotiations on Venezuela’s future was scheduled to begin on Wednesday. He also urged all Venezuelan opposition factions to join US-backed political talks with the interim president.

Earlier this year, the US Treasury dropped sanctions against Delcy Rodriguez and later lifted the restrictions on Venezuela’s central bank and its state-owned national airline, signalling Washington’s pivot from economic warfare to backroom bargaining. She has largely complied with Trump’s demands for Caracas to open up its energy industry to American companies.

As interim president, Delcy Rodriguez has promised to hold elections – including in her recent remarks at the United Nations General Assembly – but no firm date has been set. Opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Corina Machado has demanded they take place by July.

Jorge Rodriguez has shepherded several major reforms through the ruling party-controlled legislature since his sister took power, including a law that facilitated the entry of more foreign oil companies, a similar law for the mining sector and an effort to allow private investment for the country’s battered power grid.

Since Maduro’s ouster, Caracas and Washington have cut a deal giving the US access to 17 Venezuelan oil fields, while international energy firms have separately committed to expanding projects in the Latin American country. In August, Trump announced a plan to secure direct US access to a large share of Venezuela’s vast oil to refill the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Gianni ⁠Infantino faces the football leaders who ⁠want him gone on Thursday in his first meeting with FIFA’s top brass since his plan to sell a stake in FIFA tournaments, including the World Cup, collapsed.

Infantino has faced calls to resign from the leaders of three regional football confederations – UEFA (Europe), AFC (Asia) ⁠and CONCACAF (North and Central America and the Caribbean) – and their representatives will be present in Zurich for a FIFA Council meeting.

They will be joined by their counterparts from Africa, South America and Oceania.

On the agenda will be a discussion of the failed FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) scheme, which Infantino was forced to abandon ⁠within days of announcing it in July.

Under the plan, Infantino proposed selling a minority stake in a FIFA commercial subsidiary to private investors, with a company launched by Joshua Kushner, the brother of Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, identified as the proposed lead investor.

The 37-member council will also address FIFA’s governance, with some of the sport’s most powerful figures determined to limit Infantino’s powers if they cannot force him out of office.

Infantino, 56, will stand for re-election in March 2027, with a ‌November 18 deadline looming for potential candidates to submit their nominations.

Last week, former Switzerland and Tottenham Hotspur defender Ramon Vega announced that he intended to stand, but he has not confirmed whether he has the backing of the five national associations required to enter the race.

The FFE plan exposed a split in world football, with Aleksander Ceferin, Salman Al Khalifa and Victor Montagliani – the presidents respectively of UEFA, AFC and CONCACAF – saying it was time for a change at the top of FIFA.

However, Infantino has been canvassing support as he bids to remain in power and received a standing ovation when he met African football leaders last week in Cape Verde.

He is also expected to be backed by South America at next year’s election ⁠in Rabat, Morocco. Despite the AFC’s criticism of his leadership, many countries within Asia, including a bloc of Arab nations, ⁠have offered their support.

FIFA Peace Prize to Trump in spotlight

People familiar with the matter told the Reuters news agency that although the chances of finding someone to replace Infantino were remote, his opponents were determined to leave him more isolated and curb his powers.

In addition to reviewing FFE, council members are expected to discuss FIFA’s financial reserves and how much money it can release to member associations, as well as its ⁠disciplinary procedures, governance framework and Peace Prize, which was controversially awarded to US President Donald Trump last year.

Last month, UEFA and CONCACAF called on FIFA to release $10m to each of its 211 member associations, countering Infantino’s FFE proposal ⁠under which associations could receive $20m in development funding and potentially access a further $20m.

Emanuel Medeiros, ⁠founder and Global CEO of Sport Integrity Global Alliance, a pressure group for better governance in sport, said FIFA needed to have a “frank discussion” in Zurich.

“The eyes of the world are on them,” he said. “The world of football expects to see a council that takes this unique opportunity to establish a genuinely independent, comprehensive and transparent governance review … We certainly wish to see a new ‌impetus, a new dynamic.”

However, lawyer and politician Miguel Maduro, who was chairman of the FIFA Governance Committee in 2016 before being sacked by Infantino, said he would be surprised if anything meaningful came of Thursday’s meeting.

“They may announce the setting up of a working group or even an independent review of FIFA ‌governance, ‌but the credibility of either exercise will be very limited in the light of FIFA’s track record,” he said.

“Such an exercise, if not genuinely independent and enforceable, might be more of the same: a window dressing exercise simply aimed at reducing public pressure and to state they have now addressed whatever problems they had.”

FIFA to offer members $6.35bn development fund windfall

FIFA is also planning to set up a $6.35bn development fund for the next four years, the AFP news agency learned Wednesday from a source close to the matter.

The plan is due to be approved at its Council meeting on Thursday.

To finance this development fund for the 2026-2030 period, which would allow money to be distributed to FIFA’s 211 federations as well as to the regional confederations, it would draw in part on its financial reserves after a commercially successful 2026 World Cup.

The plan, first revealed by The Associated Press, would allow for the payment of $25m to each of its 211 member federations.

This is far more than the $10m called for by two of Infantino’s chief critics, Aleksander Ceferin, the boss of the European confederation UEFA, and Victor Montagliani, the head of CONCACAF, the confederation of North and Central America and the Caribbean.

Thursday’s gathering is the first such meeting since April 28, and comes amid a crisis in the governance of world football, following Infantino’s announcement earlier this year of his desire to open FIFA’s premium competitions, such as the World Cup, to private investors.

That plan was ultimately abandoned in the face of widespread criticism from the football world, with a rebellion led by UEFA, CONCACAF, and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).

At the end of September, Infantino launched a consultation process with the federations to reform how the global body operates, announcing that the first proposals could be examined as early as Thursday’s meeting.

The 56-year-old, who has headed FIFA since 2016, is running for re-election in March 2027.

His opponents have so far failed to agree on a candidate.

Ceferin has chosen to stand for a new term at the helm of UEFA and, according to several media outlets, Montagliani is expected to do the same at CONCACAF.

The deadline for submitting candidacies is November 18.