Ukraine-Russia war – live: Zelensky sacks defence minister as Putin strikes Kyiv’s grain exporting port

Volodymyr Zelensky said he has decided to dismiss his war-time defence minister Oleksii Reznikov and would ask parliament this week to replace him with Rustem Umerov, head of Ukraine’s main privatisation fund. “I’ve decided to replace the Minister of Defence of Ukraine. Oleksii Reznikov has been through more than 550 days of full-scale war,” he said, adding that he “believes the ministry needs new approaches and other formats of interaction with both the military and society as a whole”. The exit of lawyer-turned-politician Reznikov marks the biggest shakeup of Ukraine’s defence establishment during the war launched by Russia in February 2022. While he secured billions of dollars of Western military aid to help the war effort, Reznikov has been dogged by graft allegations surrounding his ministry that he described as smears. This comes as Russia launched a major drone strike on Ukraine’s grain exporting port in Odesa region this morning. The three and a half hour long drone assault damaged warehouses and set buildings on fire just hours before Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart, Tayyip Erdogan, were due to hold talks on the halted grain deal. Read More President Zelensky nominates Rustem Umerov as Ukraine’s new defence minister Russian cyber-attacks ‘relentless’ as threat of WW3 grows, expert warns Ukraine ‘targets critical bridge’ built by Putin as counteroffensive ‘breaks through on southern front’