Fedorov is thus moving from the role of head of the SBU security service to becoming a minister. Zelenskyy writes on X that he is nominating Fedorov as the new Minister of Defense and hopes that the country's parliament will approve him.
Earlier on Thursday, Serhiy Koretsky was approved as the new prime minister after Yulia Svyrydenko, who had held the post for only a year.
Fedorov, who is only 35 years old, has been defense minister for an even shorter time, since January. But he has already been praised, with much of the credit going to the drone warfare efforts that are currently yielding successes on the battlefield and arousing admiration in the outside world.
At the same time, intense power struggles have apparently been going on behind the scenes in the government under Zelensky.
Pointed out ÖB
On Thursday, Fedorov held a press conference where he singled out Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrsky and Chief of the General Staff Andriy Hnatov as responsible for a Soviet - by implication old-fashioned and ineffective - leadership style.
"Instead of planning how to defeat Russia using asymmetric methods - as the commander-in-chief should do - he has planned how the country we live in will be divided," Fedorov said of Syrsky, according to the AFP news agency.
He was casually dressed in a T-shirt at the appearance. Fedorov praised the older power rivals for the successes they achieved at the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion, from February 2022 and for about a year after that. But now drones have revolutionized warfare, and other, quicker methods are needed, the 35-year-old says.
"We will not be like the Russians, we will change our tactics - and we will tell the truth," he said, according to Ukrainian newspapers.
The last comment obviously referred to various leaked information that, among other things, Fedorov had issued an ultimatum about who should have which post.
Slogans on the streets
At the same time, demonstrations were taking place in the streets, with slogans calling on Zelensky to reappoint Fedorov as Minister of Defense.
The prime minister's post is not under attack, at least for now. The newly appointed Koretsky has made a name for himself in the energy companies Ukrnafta and Naftogaz.
