Buryatia President Vyacheslav Nagovitsyn and Leningrad Governor Valery Serdyukov resigned Friday, the Kremlin said.
This follows Thursday's resignation of Samara Governor Vladimir Artyakov as well as three other regional bosses last week, in what many are seeing as a Kremlin ploy to remove unpopular leaders before gubernatorial elections in October.
Nagovitsyn, who led the autonomous Buryatia republic since 2007, will leave his post on Saturday. Serdyukov will relinquish his duties on May 28. Serdyukov announced his resignation on his Twitter account Thursday, touting President Vladimir Putin's favorite, Alexander Drozdenko, as a possible successor.
(MT)
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