Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed a longstanding aide and multiple advisers on Saturday as part of an ongoing reshuffling of the top leadership in Kyiv.
Zelenskyy removed top aide Serhiy Shefir from his position as first assistant as stated in a brief announcement issued on Saturday. Serhiy Shefir was appointed to the Presidential Office in May 2019, as soon as Zelenskyy became President.
Shefir has a longstanding relationship with Zelenskyy, being both a close friend and business partner. Their association dates back to 1995 when brothers Serhiy and Borys Shefir organized the KVN comedy show festival in Kryvyi Rih, where they first met. In 2003, alongside Zelenskyy, they established the Kvartal 95 studio. Shefir played a pivotal role at Kvartal 95 Studio as a screenwriter, producer, and director.
According to The New Voice of Ukraine, Zelenskyy transferred his share of Kvartal 95 to Shefir on the eve of the 2019 presidential election.
On September 22, 2021, an assassination attempt was carried out on Shefir – his car was fired upon with an assault rifle in Kyiv Oblast. The vehicle sustained 18 hits, resulting in injuries to his driver, while Shefir himself escaped unharmed. The Presidential Office associated the attack on Shefir with the controversial law on deoligarchization.
According to ABC News, the Ukrainian president also dismissed three advisers, along with two presidential representatives responsible for overseeing volunteer activities and soldiers’ rights.
No explanation was provided for the latest changes in the extensive personnel shakeup that has occurred over recent months. These moves on Saturday come after the dismissal of Oleksii Danilov, who served as secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, on Tuesday. Danilov’s replacement is Oleksandr Lytvynenko, the head of Ukraine’s foreign intelligence service.
Last month, Zelenskyy removed Valerii Zaluzhnyi from his position as head of the armed forces. Subsequently, earlier this month, Zaluzhnyi was appointed as Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Kingdom.
In recent developments, Ukraine’s air force disclosed on Saturday that Russia deployed 12 Shahed drones overnight, with nine of them being intercepted and shot down. Furthermore, Russia launched four missiles into eastern Ukraine. According to updates from Ukraine’s armed forces on social media, Russia has unleashed a wave of 38 missiles, conducted 75 airstrikes, and launched 98 attacks using multiple rocket launchers in the past 24 hours.
Ukrainian energy company Centrenergo announced on Saturday that the Zmiiv Thermal Power Plant, one of the largest in the eastern Kharkiv region, was destroyed due to Russian shelling last week. As a consequence, power outage schedules were still in effect for approximately 120,000 people in the region. Following the plant’s destruction on March 22, electricity had been disrupted for 700,000 people in the area, as reported by the Associated Press.
Russia has intensified its assaults on Ukrainian energy infrastructure in recent times, resulting in considerable damage across various regions. Officials in the Poltava region reported on Saturday that an infrastructure facility had sustained “several hits,” although they did not specify whether it was an energy facility.
