Zelenskiy preparing to replace senior officials amid Ukraine leadership ‘reset’
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy
has said he is considering a “reset” to replace several senior
officials, amid ongoing speculation that he is preparing to fire the
commander-in-chief of the country’s armed forces.
“It is a question of the people who are to lead Ukraine.
A reset is necessary, I am talking about a replacement of a number of
state leaders, not only in the army sector,” Zelenskiy said
Speculation has gripped Ukraine for weeks that the president is close to dismissing the highly popular commander of the armed forces, Valerii Zaluzhnyi. The two have been at odds over the conduct of the nearly two-year-old Russian invasion of Ukraine.
But in an interview on Sunday, Zelenskiy said any
changes went beyond replacing a single person to harness efforts to
oust Russian troops.
“When I speak of
turnover, I have in mind something serious that does not concern a
single person, but the direction of the country’s leadership,” Zelenskiy
told Italian state television when asked about Zaluzhnyi.
To win the war, Zelenskiy said, “we must all push
in the same direction, we cannot be discouraged, we must have the right
and positive energy, negativity must be left at home.”
Differences have come to the fore since a Ukrainian counteroffensive launched last year made only limited gains against Russian forces which have been dug in along the 1,000-km frontline in Ukraine’s south and east.
In an essay for the Economist last November,
Zaluzhnyi said the war had entered a new phase of attrition. That drew a
rebuke from the president.
Last week, as
speculation over his dismissal intensified, he set out his case in a
commentary for broadcaster CNN for new electronic means of warfare.
He
also said some Ukrainian institutions were keeping the country from
achieving its objectives, including efforts to build an effective
fighting force to match Russian numerical superiority through “unpopular
measures” like mass moblisation.
Zaluzhnyi
has earned the admiration of Ukrainians for overseeing operations to
repel Russian forces advancing on Kyiv at the outset of the war and
subsequent advances that recaptured large swathes of territory in the
south and northeast.
On two occasions in the
past week, Ukrainian media issued a torrent of reports that Zaluzhnyi’s
dismissal was imminent. In at least one instance, the president’s
spokesperson denied the commander had been replaced.
Questions
were also raised over whether Zaluzhnyi had been offered an alternative
job, like an ambassadorship, and who might replace him.
