The News
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba resigned on Wednesday as part of a major government reshuffle that could see President Volodomyr Zelenskyy re-appoint half of all cabinet positions.
Kuleba’s resignation is the latest in a series of high-profile departures, which also include Oleksandr Kamyshin, who oversaw weapons production, as well as the country’s justice, environmental, and reintegration ministers.
In an evening address Tuesday, Zelenskyy said the government “needed to be reconfigured so that Ukraine achieves all the results we need” ahead of his expected visit to the US this month.
SIGNALS
This is not Zelenskyy’s first major reshuffle
The dramatic reshuffle has been a long time coming — the idea is to make Ukraine’s cabinet — which “barely has a quorum,” one Ukrainian lawmaker noted — into a “fully-fledged government body,” the Financial Times wrote. Some of the ministers who tendered their resignations this week may hope to return in new roles with expanded portfolios. However, Zelenskyy’s shakeups have not always been well-received: His decision to dismiss various pro-reform ministers half a year into office in 2020 sparked “substantial hand wringing” in both Washington and Kyiv, an expert wrote in the Atlantic Council, while there was some speculation that he removed the head of the army in February over fears of being personally upstaged amid a decline in popularity, think tank Chatham House noted.
Zelenskyy may hope reshuffle will breathe fresh life into war effort
Zelenskyy is “putting together a team he believes can take him across the finish line” as he prepares to present US President Joe Biden with a victory plan this month, pro-Ukraine Substack the Counteroffensive wrote. It’s possible that the plan includes proposals for negotiating an end to the fighting — while there is no official plan to hold talks, Ukraine has signaled increasing willingness to consider peace negotiations and the cabinet reshuffle could reflect that aim. But officially at least, the Kremlin remains intransigent: A spokesperson for Russian President Vladimir Putin said Zelenskyy’s shakeup was being “carefully monitored,” and insisted they would have no impact on any potential negotiations, The Moscow Times reported.