Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced on Sunday that Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov will be replaced by Rustem Umerov, a Crimean Tatar lawmaker. Zelenskyy stated that new leadership was necessary as Umerov had experienced over 550 days of full-scale war. In his evening address, Zelenskyy expressed the need for new approaches and different formats of interaction within the Ministry.
Umerov, a politician with the opposition Holos party, has previously served as the head of the State Property Fund of Ukraine. He played a significant role in various activities, including prisoner exchanges, evacuation of civilians, and negotiations with Russia over a U.N.-backed grain deal.
Earlier this year, a scandal emerged regarding the Ministry of Defense’s procurement of military jackets. Ukrainian investigative journalists reported inflated prices and the purchase of inappropriate jackets. Reznikov denied these allegations during a news conference last week.
U.S. President Joe Biden acknowledged Zelenskyy’s decision to replace the defense chief when asked by reporters but declined to provide any further comment.
Zelenskyy’s announcement coincided with a Russian drone attack on a port in Ukraine’s Odesa region. This assault occurred ahead of a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, where they were expected to discuss the resumption of food shipments from Ukraine under a Black Sea grain agreement.
Russian forces launched 25 drones along the Danube River, with 22 being shot down by Ukrainian air defenses. Zelenskyy’s chief of staff described the attack as part of Russia’s attempt to provoke a food crisis and hunger. The Russian Defense Ministry stated that the attack targeted fuel storage facilities used for military equipment.
The meeting between Putin and Erdogan, scheduled for Monday in Sochi, will include discussions on renewing the Black Sea grain initiative. The agreement, brokered by the United Nations and Turkey in July 2022, facilitated the safe export of millions of metric tons of grain from Ukrainian ports. However, Russia withdrew from the agreement, citing unfulfilled commitments related to its own exports of food and fertilizer.
In separate incidents, three individuals were killed in Russian shelling attacks in Ukraine’s Donetsk and Kherson regions. Ukrainian prosecutors initiated a war crimes investigation into the death of a police officer during a Russian shelling attack in Seredyna-Buda. Two other police officers and a civilian were wounded in this assault.