Zelenskyy’s office probed for corruption

Kyiv: Ukrainian anti-corruption agencies announced Wednesday that they are investigating senior officials in President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, a day after the country’s recently fired defence minister called for national elections despite the ongoing fight against Russia’s attack.

The revelation brought another test of Zelenskyy’s political resilience as Ukraine’s war with its bigger neighbour stretches into its fifth year.

Investigators are conducting an operation to expose a criminal organisation allegedly led by a sitting and a former lawmaker, involving senior officials from the presidential office and other individuals, according to a joint statement from Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office.

Further details would be released later, the agencies said in a joint statement.

Zelenskyy made no public comment on the investigation but issued a decree dismissing Iryna Mudra from the position of deputy head of the Office of the President.

Zelenskyy remains dogged by high-level graft investigations.

Last year, his chief of staff Andriy Yermak resigned and was later named as a suspect in a major graft probe involving a luxury construction project in the biggest threat to Zelenskyy’s government since Russia’s attack in February 2022.

Also last year, a major embezzlement and kickbacks scandal involving the state-owned nuclear power company brought the resignations of Ukraine’s justice and energy ministers.

The European Union has identified deep-seated corruption as one of the major hurdles to Ukraine’s desired membership in the bloc.

Zelenskyy’s one-time loyal aide wants a wartime election

Zelenskyy is already under pressure over his firing last month of Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, one of the longest-standing members of his team and a close ally since he helped Zelenskyy win the 2019 presidential election.

Zelenskyy, seeking to reconcile tensions between the defence ministry’s young and tech-savvy innovators and Ukraine’s seasoned, Soviet-trained battlefield leaders, risked angering both sides by reshuffling his wartime leadership. He ousted both Fedorov, whose changes to military procurement aimed to stamp out corruption, and commander-in-chief Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi.

That sparked days of street protests in support of Fedorov. For Zelenskyy, it was the second time in a year that a wartime decision triggered a strong public backlash, after he moved in mid-2025 to curb the powers of anti-corruption agencies.

Fedorov, in a video address posted to YouTube late Tuesday, called for elections to be held in Ukraine in a bombshell statement that appeared to directly confront Zelenskyy, who says a ballot can’t be held under the martial law in place due to the war.

“We must find a legal, safe and realistic mechanism that will allow Ukraine to restore a full democratic process even amid a prolonged war,” Fedorov said.

He said Ukraine is facing a systemic crisis in how it is governed, arguing that the current system is oriented toward protecting itself and resisting change. He also condemned corruption among officials without naming anyone, saying it had weakened Ukraine’s ability to fight the war.

Zelenskyy’s office did not immediately comment on Fedorov’s address. It was not immediately clear whether Fedorov’s appeal for a ballot would resonate with Ukrainians.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has balked at negotiating a peace deal directly with Zelenskyy, asserts that the Ukrainian president is an illegitimate leader because his term expired in 2024.

Ukraine’s Parliament approved Zelenskyy’s candidate, Yevhenii Khmara, as the new defence minister in a vote Wednesday, a move that effectively closes the door to Fedorov’s return to the post, which he has sought, any time soon.

Lawmakers also gave their consent for Andrii Sybiha to stay on as foreign minister after holding the post in an interim role.