{"id":704013,"date":"2026-07-21T20:55:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T20:55:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/704013\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T20:55:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T20:55:09","slug":"ukraine-russia-war-zelensky-sacks-top-army-commander-after-days-of-protests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/704013\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine Russia war: Zelensky sacks top army commander after days of protests"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has sacked the country&#8217;s commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">His dismissal comes just days after the removal of popular Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov &#8211; a move that triggered street protests across the country.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Initial rumours that the end of Fedorov&#8217;s tenure was related to a conflict between him and Syrskyi were soon confirmed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Fedorov, 35, has been widely praised for energising the ministry and transforming the armed forces, as well as leading a drive against corruption. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Syrskyi, 60, is seen by many in Ukraine as a Soviet-school commander reluctant to implement radical changes in the army.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He was replaced by Mykhailo Drapatyi, who is a popular, battle-hardened general.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In a video post on social media late on Tuesday, Zelensky thanked Syrskyi for his military campaigns, including his role in successfully defending the capital Kyiv during the first days of Russia&#8217;s full-scale invasion in 2022.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Zelensky also revealed that earlier in the day, he met Fedorov and offered him a &#8220;worthy position in power&#8221;, but did not say whether the offer had been accepted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Fedorov was last week replaced by Yevhenii Khmara, a former top official at Ukraine&#8217;s Security Service (SBU). <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;All decisions will be formalised tomorrow,&#8221; Zelensky added in his post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has sacked the country&#8217;s commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi. His dismissal comes just days after the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":704014,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-704013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=704013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/704013\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/704014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=704013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=704013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=704013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}