Mykhailo Fedorov, the recently ousted Ukrainian defense minister, has broken ranks to demand that President Volodymyr Zelensky answer for the corruption festering within his inner circle.
While Fedorov stopped short of accusing the president of direct personal involvement in illegal activities, he insisted that Zelensky must be held accountable for whether he was aware of the rampant graft that has recently led to high-profile money laundering investigations.
The former minister, who spearheaded Ukraine’s drone warfare initiatives, emphasized that the president has a moral responsibility to address these questions to maintain the integrity of the state.
Beyond the corruption allegations, Fedorov is aggressively pushing for the resumption of national elections, which have been suspended under martial law since the 2022 Russian invasion. He argued that democracy cannot be held hostage by the war, stating that if the country abandons the electoral process, it ceases to be a democracy.
This call for a vote has been met with stiff resistance from the Zelensky administration, which maintains that elections during an active conflict would be a dangerous, destabilizing 'tsunami.' As Fedorov prepares for a trip to the United States to lobby for further technological support, he also took aim at the sluggish bureaucracy of Western allies, including the UK, for failing to deliver critical military aid in a timely manner.
He argued that Western governments are lagging behind the reality of the battlefield, urging them to pivot from sending outdated equipment to directly funding modern drone production.
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