MEZIESBLOG

Ukraine’s parliament has started voting on major ministerial dismissals announced yesterday. 

The parliament failed to sack the head of the state property fund, Vitaliy Koval, in the first vote, lawmakers said. 

It comes as the country’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, resigned earlier this morning – the highest-profile casualty so far of a major government reshuffle ordered by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Mr Kuleba, 43, did not give a reason for stepping down.

Mr Zelenskyy indicated last week that a reshuffle was imminent, in what has been cast as the start of a government “reset” ahead of the cold autumn and winter seasons. 

‘Everything was on fire’ – witnesses describe Lviv attack

Residents in Lviv are waking up to significant destruction after an overnight attack on the western city.

One woman has described how she was forced to leave the shelter she was hiding in because “everything was on fire”. She also struggled to find another shelter because “smoke [was] covering everything”.

Another man said Russia was trying to “destroy and intimidate us” by hitting residential areas.

Putin returns to Russia after controversial Mongolia trip

Vladimir Putin has returned from his controversial trip to Mongolia and is visiting the eastern city of Vladivostok today. 

He met the Chinese vice president Han Zheng at the Eastern Economic Forum before speaking with Russian Pacific fleet commander Admiral Viktor Liina, at the naval base of the Russian Pacific Fleet’s Primorye Flotilla.

Ukraine had called for Mongolia to arrest Putin on an international warrant for alleged war crimes stemming from Moscow’s invasion in 2022.

Instead, Mr Putin received a warm welcome from the nation – a member of the International Criminal Court, which issued the warrant in March 2023.