Ukraine appoints new Foreign Minister

Kyiv, Sep 6 (IANS) The Ukrainian Parliament has voted to appoint Andrii Sybiha as the country's new Foreign Minister, replacing Dmytro Kuleba, according to lawmaker Oleksii Honcharenko.

Sybiha won the support of 258 of 315 lawmakers present, Honcharenko said on Thursday on Telegram.

Earlier on Thursday, the Parliament voted to dismiss Kuleba, who tendered his resignation on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency reported.

Sybiha, 49, previously served as deputy head of the President's Office and became Kuleba's deputy in April.

Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, has said of the reshuffle, which is taking place at a critical juncture in the war with Russia, that the country needed "new energy".

Sybiha, a career diplomat, worked for several years in Zelensky's office. He is one of eight new Ministers expected to be appointed on Thursday.

Critics have said that the reshuffle represents a consolidation of power by a small group of Zelenskiy loyalists allied with Andriy Yermak, the head of the President's Office.

A former Ambassador to Turkey, Sybiha had also served as Yermak's deputy.

Alexander Kamyshin, a popular figure feted for keeping Ukraine's railways running through the war, is also being moved from the Strategic Industries Ministry to the President's Office.

Others have raised eyebrows over the timing of the reshuffle, amid a recent increase in Russian missile attacks on Ukraine.

The appointments come as Zelensky is preparing to travel to the US later this month to present what Kyiv has called his "victory plan" to the US President Joe Biden, a key ally.

Zelensky has repeatedly called on allies to lift restrictions that ban Kyiv from using western weapons for long-range strikes into Russia.

Russian forces are inching forward in the east and have stepped up their campaign of missile and drone attacks on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities far from the frontline, hitting the power sector and other infrastructure in almost daily attacks.

Russian President, Vladimir Putin, said on Thursday that Ukraine's incursion into the Russian region of Kursk had failed to slow Russia's own advance in eastern Ukraine and had weakened Kyiv's defences along the frontline in a boost to Moscow.

That was countered by Nato's Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, who told reporters in Oslo that Ukraine had achieved "a lot" in its Kursk offensive.

Putin, speaking at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, said that Russian forces were gradually pushing Ukrainian soldiers out of Kursk, where on August 6, Ukraine launched the biggest foreign attack on Russia since the second world war.

Zelensky has said Kyiv plans to hold territory in Kursk and that the operation, which he says is part of a not fully disclosed victory plan, has brought the war home to Russians.

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