Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba became the latest top official to tender his resignation on Wednesday, ahead of a major government reshuffle, as yet another wave of Russian attacks overnight killed at least seven people, including a child.
As Ukraine’s top diplomat, Kuleba has been a prominent fixture in Zelensky’s administration and one of the most public-facing, especially dealing with overseas officials. He was seen as a capable politician and a safe pair of hands, one of the strongest members of Zelensky’s cabinet. His offer to resign comes ahead of an expected visit by the president to the United States this month.
Kuleba’s was the latest in a flurry of resignations. Two of Ukraine’s vice premiers, three ministers, the head of the State Property Fund and a top official in Zelensky’s Presidential Office have all quit within the last day or so.
The parliament approved Kuleba’s resignation on Thursday and Andrii Sybiha was sworn in as foreign minister to replace him. Sybiha has previously served as ambassador to Turkey and deputy head of the presidential office.
The resignations of the three other ministers and one of the vice premiers were approved on Wednesday.
Zelensky has not yet given any explanation for the reshuffle, but said in his nightly address on Tuesday that the coming fall will be “extremely important for Ukraine” and as such “our state institutions must be set up so that Ukraine achieves all the results we need.”
Kuleba and others who tendered their resignations are widely expected to be appointed into other roles in the Zelensky administration. The reshuffle comes at a precarious time for Ukraine. Its troops are under increasing pressure on the eastern frontlines, especially around the strategic city of Pokrovsk that is on the brink of falling to Russia.
It seems likely that Zelensky wants to have his new team in place for his trip to the US later this month, where he is expected to attend the United Nation General Assembly and meet the US President Joe Biden. Zelensky said last week that he intends to present Biden with a new four-part “victory plan” – without providing details.
The last major change Zelensky made to the top echelon of Ukraine’s leadership came in February, when he replaced the former Commander in Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi with Oleksander Syrskyi. Zaluzhnyi currently serves as Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Kingdom.
Ukrainian political scientist Mykola Davydiuk said there were no major disagreements within the government. Instead, Zelensky is likely trying to send a signal that he is injecting new energy into his government.
“(The president’s office) wanted to do this last fall, then in December, then in May. They spoke about it so they need to do something, otherwise people will not believe them,” he said, adding that Zelensky likely sensed a window of opportunity for the reshuffle. “The West can’t criticize him now because they have a lot of domestic issues to deal with – the US election, election trouble in Germany and France,” he added.
Davyd Arakhamia, the majority leader of Ukraine’s parliament, said Tuesday that there would be major changes expected in the cabinet this week.
“As promised, a major government reset can be expected this week. More than 50% of the Cabinet of Ministers’ staff will be changed,” Arakhamia said on Telegram, adding that new members would be appointed imminently.
Among those who have resigned was the Minister for Strategic Industries Oleksandr Kamyshin, who was in charge of weapons production. He is expected to assume another defense role, Reuters reported.
The resignations also include the justice, environment and reintegration ministers.
“To do this, we need to strengthen some areas of the government… I am also counting on a slightly different weight for certain areas of our foreign and domestic policy,” Arakhamia said.
View this interactive content on CNN.comSpeaking to CNN Chief International Anchor Christiane Amanpour Tuesday, Kuleba said he expects Putin to continue increasing air attacks on Ukraine before winter sets in.
“Putin still has the same purpose to freeze people, to destroy our economy and this is his strategy. So I’m afraid he will continue with his barrage of missile and drone attacks over the course of the autumn,” he said.
The attacks, Kuleba said, are “just another reason why delivery of air defense systems to Ukraine must be expedited.”
Missiles hit Lviv
The expected reshuffle came as Russian missiles continued to rain down on Ukrainian cities. Just a day after two ballistic missiles hit an educational facility in Poltava in central Ukraine, a major attack struck Lviv, a city in western Ukraine that has long been considered a safe haven in the war-torn country.
Lviv’s mayor Andriy Sadovyi said seven people, including a 14-year-old girl, were killed and 25 were injured in the attacks.
A 15-month-old child suffered “moderate” injuries and four other children have minor injuries, according to the head of the city’s regional military administration Maksym Kozytskyi.
Lviv, in Ukraine’s far west, is generally far away from Russian borders, which means missiles and drones take longer to reach it – giving the Ukrainian military more time to shoot them down. Many people from eastern regions relocated there to seek safety.
Kozytskyi said that at least seven “architectural monuments of local importance,” including houses located in a historic part of the city and inside a UNESCO buffer zone, were also damaged in the attack.
On Tuesday, a Russian strike against a military educational facility in central Ukraine killed 54 people and injured nearly 300 others, according to the state emergency service of Ukraine. It was one of the deadliest single attacks since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Ukraine’s Air Force said Wednesday it shot down 22 attack drones and seven cruise missiles.
At the same time, Ukraine is still reeling from a massive wave of attacks against the energy infrastructure last week. Power cuts are still impacting lives across Ukraine, with millions suffering from power cuts every day.
At least five people were killed and more than 10 wounded in Russian attacks in the central city of Kryvyi Rih after a hotel building was destroyed, according to the head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration Serhiy Lysak.
The strike on Kryvyi Rih appears to be part of a wave of Russian attacks targeting hotels. Facilities in Kramatorsk, Zaporizhzhia, and another one in Kryvyi Rih were all hit by strikes in the past week or so.
Speaking about the attacks, Zelensky again appealed for Kyiv’s allies to supply Ukraine with more air defenses and to lift restrictions on the use of western weapons on targets in Russia.
Nuclear power plant worries
Meanwhile, the chief of the UN nuclear watchdog, Rafael Grossi, visited the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in occupied southern Ukraine on Wednesday.
Grossi, who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Tuesday that the situation at the largest nuclear power plant in Europe was “very fragile.” The Ukrainian energy company Energoatom said one of two power supply lines to the plant was damaged on Monday following Russian strikes in the region.
“Today we have one of the two existing power lines down, which means that the station is again on the verge of being on a blackout,” Grossi told reporters in Kyiv on Tuesday, before heading to Zaporizhzhia.
Explaining why a power cut could cause a serious accident at the plant, Grossi said: “Blackout, no power… No power, no cooling… No cooling, maybe you have a disaster.”
This story has been updated.