The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine may approve updated rules for responding to air raid alerts as early as September 3. This was stated in a comment to journalists by Presidential Advisor Dmytro Lytvyn, who noted that the government "will finalize the changes once it works out all the details today." According to him, tomorrow's deadline for adopting the document is the most likely one.

Two alert levels: "yellow" and "red"

On September 2, following a meeting with Prime Minister Serhiy Horetskyi, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced the introduction of two levels of air raid alert. The "yellow" level will be declared in the event of a threat of a drone attack, while the "red" level will be declared in the event of a threat of a missile strike, as well as during large-scale attacks. Thus, the alert system will become more differentiated and tied to the nature of the actual threat.

What will change for businesses and enterprises

The key practical change concerns economic activity: during a "yellow" alert, enterprises and businesses will not be required to suspend operations. This is expected to reduce losses from regular short-term alerts, which previously automatically led to the shutdown of production and commercial processes.

Special measures for Kyiv

For the capital, the president separately outlined a package of decisions: in Kyiv, the curfew will be shortened, and during alerts the entire "green" line of the metro will be allowed to operate. In addition, the number of surface transport vehicles in the capital will be increased to ensure passenger transfers and reduce the load on the underground line.

Context: why the rules are being revised

According to Ukrainian authorities, the review of security rules during air raid alerts is a response to the constant attacks by Russian jet drones. It is this factor, according to Kyiv's statements, that makes the previous single alert model ineffective and requires the scenarios to be divided by threat level.

Timeline and status of the decision

As of the time of publication, on September 2, the final decision of the Cabinet of Ministers has not yet been made: Dmytro Lytvyn described it as most likely on September 3, after the details are worked out during the current day. Thus, the new rules are still at the stage of final coordination within the government and have not yet entered into force.