- Urges security agencies to only shoot at Russian occupiers
- Three officers reportedly wounded in clash
- Patriots could take years to make – US Secretary of State Rubio
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has expressed fury over a violent shootout between personnel from Ukraine’s Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and the Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) which erupted in Kyiv on September 2, 2026.
The clash involving the two intelligence and security services reportedly left three officers injured. The SBU is Ukraine’s internal security service, like MI5 or the FBI while the GUR, or HUR, is its armed forces counterpart and also carries out military activities and special operations.
The Ukrainian President described the situation as “absolutely shameful” while calling in prosecutors and investigators, as well as firing a Senior SBU officer in the process.
“Here in Ukraine, shooting is only permissible at Russian occupiers in defence of Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said, adding: “Our state will not perceive any other shootout as something that anyone is allowed to do.”
According to reports available, the gunfight stemmed from the SBU taking into custody a leader of an anti-Kremlin Russian unit that fights for Ukraine under the watch of the GUR.
Meanwhile, Russian drones hit central Kyiv on Wednesday in a seventh day of intense strikes on the capital with explosions being heard again in the early hours of Thursday morning.
Authorities said on Wednesday that 11 people were wounded, and residential and university buildings damaged, even as Russia also struck power facilities in the southern Odesa region with missiles and drones, knocking out power to more than 350,000 homes.
According to the Regional Governor, two people were killed and eight wounded in strikes on the south-eastern city of Dnipro, where food warehouses and educational buildings were damaged.
In another development, Ukraine has urged the United Nations (UN)’s aviation agency, the ICAO, and its member countries to ban their airlines from Russian airspace, a day after Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned it was “becoming completely unsafe” because of Ukrainian drones.
Ukraine wrote to agency seeking “the full prohibition by ICAO member states of civil aircraft operations within the airspace of the Russian Federation”. In response to Ukraine’s warning, the ICAO called on its members to ensure the safety of civilian aircraft. “Long-range weapons systems, unmanned aircraft systems [UAS], global navigation satellite system radio frequency interference, and advanced air defence systems are among the military technologies jeopardising civilian aviation.”
On plans for Ukraine to build Patriot air defence interceptors, United States (US) Secretary of State, Marco Antonio Rubio said doing so is not an immediate solution for Kyiv, adding: “I mean, these are highly sophisticated weaponry”.
Rubio, who told Fox News that the US was negotiating with Ukraine over licensed production of Patriot missiles, said: “That may come to fruition, but it really won’t solve the short-term challenge that they’re pointing to,” adding that, “The whole world is asking for more air interceptors” but US needs came first.
“It’s become the number one defence need on the planet, not just for Ukraine, but on the planet,” including in the Middle East because of the US-Israeli war against Iran.
In the meantime, President Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s air raid alerting system would be revised into two tiers, red for missiles, yellow for drones, allowing for more “predictability and a better understanding of how to react”.
He said that curfew hours would be reduced and more above-ground transport options offered to compensate for metro closures, explaining that the measures were a response to “Russia’s changing tactics” and “its use of drones to wear down civilian life in our cities and disrupt normal economic activity across our country”.
