Ukraine’s new Russian-born army chief is a “traitor”, senior Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev has said today.
Last night we reported Volodymyr Zelenskyy had switched out General Valeriy Zaluzhny for Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi.
Born in Russia’s Vladimir region, which was then part of the Soviet Union, the new chief studied in Moscow – at the Higher Military Command School – among peers who have since become Russian commanders.
He served for five years in the Soviet Artillery Corps and has lived in Ukraine since the 1980s.
Responding to his new role, Mr Medvedev, Russia’s ex-president accused Mr Syrskyi, who did not serve in post-Soviet Russia’s army, of breaking his oath as an officer.
“Looking at the biography of the new commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian armed forces Syrskyi, one feels a sense of hatred, contempt and disgust,” Mr Medvedev wrote on Telegram.
“Disgust for a man who was a Soviet Russian officer, but became a Bandera traitor, who broke his oath and serves the Nazis, destroying his loved ones. May the earth burn under his feet.”
“Bandera” is a reference to Stepan Bandera, a Second World War-era Ukrainian nationalist who collaborated with Nazi Germany to fight against the Red Army.
He is regarded as a freedom fighter by some Ukrainians but as a traitor by many Russians.
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