Medium and long-range strikes against Russia will continue under Mykhailo Drapatyi, Ukraine’s new top military commander, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Tuesday, as he replaced Oleksandr Syrskyi in the job after a huge political row accompanied by street protests. “The operations of the Ukrainian defence forces are ongoing and must continue steadily,” said the Ukrainian president. “Ukraine’s plan for long-range sanctions and our programme of middle-range strikes will be carried out with absolute precision.”
Luke Harding writes that news of Drapatyi’s appointment came in a late-night TV address by Zelenskyy. The president offered a “prominent position” to Mykhailo Fedorov – the defence minister he sacked last week in a shock move that brought out protesters who have given a deadline of Friday for Fedorov to be reinstated. Fedorov welcomed Drapatyi’s appointment as a “breath of fresh air” bringing “new hope to the struggle of free people for freedom and justice”.
Zelenskyy paid tribute to Syrskyi, crediting him with leading the defence of Kyiv and launching a counter-invasion of Russia’s Kursk province. Drapatyi, his replacement, is well regarded within Ukraine’s army and liked by the public, Harding writes. He is viewed as an ally of Fedorov, a tech-savvy moderniser. A major general, Drapatyi is commander of Ukraine’s joint forces group and has been fighting Russia since its covert attempt in 2014 to take over the eastern Donbas region. He is famed for driving an infantry fighting vehicle over a barricade set up by pro-Russian militants in Mariupol.
