{
  "type": "article",
  "title": "Kyiv streets erupt as Ukraine's president sacks his celebrated defence chief",
  "summary": "Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky removed Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov and named Maj-Gen Yevhen Khmara acting minister, triggering street protests and an outcry from soldiers and lawmakers after it emerged the move followed tension with Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi.",
  "content": "A sudden decision by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to remove Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov from his post has triggered a wave of public anger, street protests and pointed criticism from lawmakers across Ukraine, exposing a deep rift at the top of the country's wartime leadership. The move, coming in the middle of an ongoing war with Russia, has raised fresh questions about how well Ukraine's civilian and military leadership are working together at a critical moment, and about how much room the president has to manage internal disputes without triggering public backlash.\n\nKyiv's streets fill with anger\nOn Thursday morning, crowds made up largely of young people gathered in Kyiv and in other Ukrainian cities to protest against Fedorov's removal, in one of the more visible displays of public dissent Ukraine has seen since the start of the full-scale war. Demonstrators held up placards reading \"Hands off Fedorov\" and \"Stop sabotaging victory!\", while chants of \"Shame!\" echoed through the gathering. At a protest in Ivan Franko square in central Kyiv, two young demonstrators held signs that read \"What are you doing, you idiot?\" and \"This is for all of those who couldn't be here.\" Maria Lavrynets, 31, who joined the protest, said: \"I have lots of friends in the military. Lots of them died. I don't want this to go on.\" She added: \"We see Fedorov's results. We see the motivation of the soldiers, we should stand for them.\" Zelensky, asked to comment on the demonstrations, said: \"People wanted to come out, and that's right. I understand, I hear, and I even react to what society is saying.\"\n\nA caretaker steps into the defence ministry\nBy Thursday evening, Zelensky had named Major-General Yevhen Khmara, the acting head of the Security Service of Ukraine, known as the SBU, as acting defence minister, a move that hands temporary control of the ministry to a senior intelligence and security official rather than another political appointee. Announcing the appointment, Zelensky said: \"Khmara has gained extensive and, in many respects, unprecedented experience with technological combat operations.\" Ahead of the announcement, MPs had been expected to vote on Thursday on a separate proposal to install Ihor Klymenko, who currently heads the interior ministry, as the new defence minister. Zelensky said, however, that Klymenko's name was only one of several under consideration and that no formal nomination had actually been submitted to parliament yet, leaving the identity of the permanent successor still unsettled.\n\nThe rift with the commander-in-chief\nRumours had begun to circulate that Fedorov's exit was tied to tension between him and Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi, and both Fedorov and Zelensky went on to all but confirm this in their own public remarks. Fedorov revealed on Thursday that he had proposed to Zelensky that Syrskyi and the Chief of the General Staff, Andrii Hnatov, be replaced. Speaking at a joint press conference with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Zelensky acknowledged that the conflict between the General Staff and the defence ministry had been \"systemic\" and had played out \"at various levels\", adding that Syrskyi and Fedorov had only ever managed to work together through his own mediation. At his own separate press conference, Fedorov recalled: \"When the president said he did not plan to replace Syrskyi, I... said I would learn to work with him.\" He went on, however, to say that \"all the initiatives we proposed were blocked.\" Speaking about Syrskyi directly, Fedorov said: \"Instead of finding a way of defeating Russia asymmetrically, which is the commander-in-chief's job, he's found a way of splitting our country.\" Syrskyi responded in a short message posted to Telegram, writing that he was \"proud\" of the defence operation mounted around Kyiv in 2022 when Russian troops were closing in on the capital. He said he would continue to \"focus on the war and on an effective strategy\" and wished Fedorov \"continued success\" in a closing line that read as notably terse given the scale of the public dispute between the two men.\n\nThe minister who rewired Ukraine's defence ministry\nFedorov, 35, had only been appointed defence minister in January but in that short period was credited with energising a ministry many in Ukraine had long viewed as too bogged down in bureaucracy and lingering Soviet-era attitudes. He led a drive against corruption inside the ministry and pushed the use of data to analyse and improve Ukraine's performance on the front line, an approach that marked a sharp break from the ministry's older, slower-moving culture. Before entering government, Fedorov had served as Ukraine's minister of digital transformation, and from the earliest days of Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022 he set up a volunteer \"IT Army of Ukraine\" that launched cyber-attacks against Russian targets. He later led a successful fundraising campaign known as the Army of Drones and introduced elements of \"gamification\" into the war effort, designing a system that awarded Ukrainian military units credits for hitting Russian assets, an approach meant to encourage units to compete for verified strikes. That same appetite for high-tech warfare, drones and modernised procurement carried into his time as defence minister. In the early days of his tenure in the role, he asked SpaceX founder Elon Musk to stop Russia from using Starlink satellites for drone attacks, a request that caused considerable disruption to Russian frontline operations and advances, given how central Starlink connectivity had become to battlefield communications on both sides. His ministry also played a significant part in Ukraine's recent attacks on the Moscow-occupied Crimean peninsula; only last month, Fedorov vowed to \"cut off\" Crimea from Russia entirely through the use of mid-range drone strikes, underlining how far the ministry's ambitions had shifted toward long-range, technology-driven operations under his watch.\n\nA wider reshuffle in Kyiv\nFedorov's removal came as part of a broader reshuffle by Zelensky that has reordered more than one senior post in Kyiv this week. Parliament also approved the appointment of Serhiy Koretsky, the head of the state oil and gas company, as the new prime minister, after Yuliia Svyrydenko resigned from the role earlier in the week, meaning Ukraine's government has changed hands at both the premiership and the defence ministry within the space of a few days, a pace of change that is unusual even by the standards of wartime Kyiv.\n\nFedorov turns down a consolation role\nFedorov revealed that Zelensky had offered to keep him on his team as an adviser, but that he had turned the offer down. He said he was not trying to antagonise the president and explained that he was \"confident\" that Zelensky \"hears the Ukrainian people, knows what to do, and the situation will be 100% resolved.\" He added: \"I don't believe he has yet chosen a side in the Syrskyi matter. I spoke with him today and said that I am acting according to my conscience.\" In a Facebook post shortly after his dismissal, Fedorov listed his achievements in the role and said he would \"continue... to defeat the enemy through asymmetry, speed of innovation, and organisational strength.\"\n\nSoldiers and allies rally behind Fedorov\nThe removal drew strong criticism from people who had worked with or under Fedorov, several of whom went public with their objections within hours of the news breaking. \"This is the worst mistake Zelensky has made during his entire presidency,\" Oleksandr, a Ukrainian soldier, said. He explained that he had signed up to the army earlier this year because he trusted Fedorov's team and vision, adding: \"I don't know anyone who supports the decision to replace him. Not within the army, not in society.\" Prominent blogger Serhii Sternenko, whom Fedorov had brought in as an adviser, described his former boss as \"the best minister of defence in our entire history\" and criticised the \"bureaucratic obstacles and artificial delays\" he said had stood in the way of deeper reform. Another former adviser, a tech expert who goes by the nickname \"Flash\", said being part of Fedorov's team had been an honour, adding: \"I had access to various systems and could analyse the actions of our enemy. I could predict their next steps. I will no longer be able to do that.\" Pavlo Yelizarov, a well-known drone unit commander, resigned from his post as deputy commander of the Ukrainian Air Force in protest at Fedorov's sacking, calling the decision \"a great evil for the country's defence capability.\"\n\nWhat comes next for Ukraine's leadership\nTaken together, the protests, the resignations and the unusually blunt public exchanges between Fedorov, Syrskyi and Zelensky point to a leadership dispute that has spilled well beyond closed-door politics and into open public view, at a moment when Ukraine can least afford visible division at the top of its war effort. How Zelensky manages the fallout, and who he ultimately settles on as a permanent defence minister, will likely shape perceptions of his government's stability in the weeks ahead, both among ordinary Ukrainians and among Kyiv's international backers.\n\nWhat this means for you\nThis is a story about Ukraine's wartime leadership rather than a policy or price change that directly touches readers elsewhere, but it matters to anyone following the Russia-Ukraine war.\n\n• For war watchers: A public rift between Ukraine's civilian defence leadership and its top military commander, playing out alongside street protests in Kyiv, signals internal strain that could shape how Ukraine coordinates its drone campaigns and frontline strategy in the months ahead.\n\nQuestions & Answers\n\n1. Why was Mykhailo Fedorov removed as defence minister?\nBoth Fedorov and Zelensky indicated the move stemmed from tension with Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi, after Fedorov proposed replacing Syrskyi and Chief of the General Staff Andrii Hnatov.\n\n2. Who was named acting defence minister in Fedorov's place?\nMajor-General Yevhen Khmara, the acting head of Ukraine's Security Service (SBU), was named acting defence minister.\n\n3. How long had Fedorov been defence minister?\nFedorov, 35, had only been appointed to the role in January.\n\n4. What happened in Ukraine after Fedorov's removal?\nCrowds made up largely of young people protested in Kyiv and other cities on Thursday morning with placards and chants, and several soldiers and former advisers also spoke out publicly against the decision.\n\n5. What did Fedorov accuse Syrskyi of?\nFedorov said that instead of finding a way to defeat Russia asymmetrically, which he called the commander-in-chief's job, Syrskyi had found a way to split the country, and that initiatives he proposed were blocked.\n\n6. Who was proposed as Fedorov's permanent successor?\nInterior Minister Ihor Klymenko's name was floated, but Zelensky said it was only one of several names being considered and no formal nomination had been submitted yet.\n\n7. What other government changes happened alongside this?\nParliament approved Serhiy Koretsky, head of the state oil and gas company, as the new prime minister after Yuliia Svyrydenko resigned from the role earlier in the week.\n\n8. Why did Fedorov turn down staying on as an adviser?\nFedorov said Zelensky had offered him an advisory role, but he declined it, saying he was acting according to his conscience.",
  "url": "https://trendkia.com/en/europe/ukraine-men-sarakon-para-utare-loga-zelensky-ke-lokapriya-raksha-mntri-ko-hatae-jane-se-bharaka-gussa-8193",
  "category": "Europe",
  "publishedAt": "2026-07-16",
  "tags": [
    "Ukraine",
    "Zelensky",
    "Mykhailo Fedorov",
    "Defence Minister",
    "Oleksandr Syrskyi",
    "Kyiv Protests",
    "IT Army",
    "Crimea Drone Strikes"
  ],
  "language": "en",
  "site": "TrendKia"
}