Ukraine’s government reshuffle will not affect potential peace talks with Russia, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists Wednesday.
At least six top Ukrainian officials including cabinet ministers have submitted their resignations since Tuesday, while a presidential aide was dismissed. David Arakhamia, who heads the ruling party’s parliamentary faction, declared Wednesday a “day of dismissals.”
“This reshuffle had been expected for a while,” Ukrainian lawmaker Oleksandr Merezhko was quoted as saying by The Kyiv Independent. The reasons for the resignations were not immediately clear, but Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in March that the country could expect a government shake-up in the future.
Peskov said the Kremlin was “carefully monitoring” the resignations and appointments in Kyiv, but ruled out that they would bring the sides to the negotiating table.
“No, it won’t have any effect whatsoever and it has nothing to do with the prospects of the negotiation process,” he told reporters.
President Vladimir Putin and other Kremlin officials have dismissed the possibility of talks amid Ukraine’s ongoing incursion into the southwestern Kursk region, which has displaced tens of thousands of people.
Zelensky told NBC News on Tuesday that Ukraine would hold territory it captured in Russia as leverage to bring Moscow to the negotiating table, though Western military analysts have warned that Ukrainian forces risk overextending themselves as they make further advances into Russian territory.
Putin previously said he would consider negotiating a ceasefire if Ukraine ceded control over the remaining parts of the partially occupied Donetsk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia and Luhansk regions.
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