San Francisco: Tech billionaire Elon Musk says his rocket firm SpaceX will continue funding its Starlink Internet service in Ukraine, a day after he said it could no longer do so.
On the microblogging site Twitter, Musk wrote that “the hell with it… Even though Starlink is still losing money and other companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we’ll just keep funding Ukraine govt for free”.
According to the BBC, Starlink has been vital for Ukraine’s military and people to stay online.
Ukraine says it helped to reboot key infrastructure after Russian attacks.
Energy installations were among the facilities targeted by more than 100 Russian missiles this week. Starlink consists of thousands of satellites in low-Earth orbit and ground terminals.
Last month, Musk asked the Pentagon to fund the Starlink programme instead of him, according to the US media.
And on Friday, he tweeted: “SpaceX is not asking to recoup past expenses, but also cannot fund the existing system indefinitely”. That move drew strong criticism.
Earlier, Musk provoked Kyiv’s ire by suggesting Ukraine could cede territory to Russia.
–IANS