Ukraine is aiming to build at least 50,000 combat robots to support and replace its soldiers fighting on the frontline. 

Ukrainian officials say that using unmanned weapons would help Ukraine optimise its headcount while fighting Russia and free soldiers from dangerous tasks, Bloomberg reports.

It comes as Ukrainian President Zelensky appealed to the West for more missile defences after a major Russian air attack on Kyiv killed 17 people.

Ukraine has already been using combat robots to fight Russia.  

In the east of the country, near Dobropillia, the 93rd Mechanised Brigade used a robot equipped with a flamethrower to target Russian positions established on the edge of a wooded area, allowing Ukrainian troops to neutralise the remaining fighters. 

Last month, Ukraine landed a remote-controlled combat robot using an unmanned naval drone that travelled nearly 7 miles to reach the shore of the occupied Kinburn Spit in southern Ukraine. 

The Wolly 7.62 ground robot carried a machine gun loaded with ammunition that fired on Russian troop positions, forcing them to pull back from part of the coastline.  

Also last month, footage captured how Russian soldiers surrendered to a Ukrainian patrol made up entirely of robots and drones.

Video shows both FPV and kamikaze ground drones striking a Russian dugout, before troops emerge holding a handwritten sign reading 'We want to surrender'. 

In a historic first, the soldiers were taken prisoner without a single Ukrainian infantryman present - marking the world’s first successful combat capture using only unmanned aerial and ground drones.

The operation, conducted by the Third Assault Brigade on July 8 or 9 in Kharkiv Oblast, allowed the Ukrainians to retake territory without their soldiers firing a single bullet.

During the assault, which lasted just 15 minutes, FPV drones first struck Russian dugouts, causing chaos among the troops.

Moments later, unmanned ground vehicles loaded with powerful explosives moved toward the already battered fortification.

As the first drone - reportedly carrying an anti-tank mine - detonated, the Russian soldiers realised the imminent danger and created a cardboard sign to signal their surrender before a second drone could strike.

Ukraine, which has a fraction of Russia's population and a much smaller economy, has had little choice but to try and use new technologies to tackle its opponent, with Kyiv's new commander-in-chief, Mykhailo Drapatyi, backing the massive integration of robotics on the front lines.

It comes as Zelensky urged his allies to increase the supply of drone interceptors after Ukraine failed to shoot down a single ballistic missile fired by Russia on Wednesday.

'Ballistic missile interceptors could have saved the lives of those killed today,' Zelensky said. 

'Quite literally every single day, the lives of people here in Ukraine depend on the decisiveness of our partners in Europe and America.'

NATO's secretary general Mark Rutte said the alliance was working to get Ukraine the air defences it 'urgently needs.' 

Russian attacks on Kyiv and its surrounding region on Wednesday killed 17 people and wounded dozens more. 

Moscow has been exploiting Ukraine's critical shortage of interceptors for the U.S.-made Patriot systems, the sole air defence weapon in its arsenal able to shoot down ballistic missiles.

Zelensky has pleaded with other countries, especially the U.S., to send more of the ammunition made scarcer by the Iran war. 

Failing that, he wants to make Patriot ammunition in Ukraine or win permission from Elon Musk to use his Starlink satellite communications system to guide strikes inside Russia that can hit its missile launchers.