LONDON (Reuters) -Russia has sacked the commander of its Western military district, the news outlet RBC reported on Monday, the latest in a series of top officials to be fired after a series of defeats and humiliations in the war in Ukraine.
RBC said Colonel-General Alexander Zhuravlyov would be replaced by Lieutenant-General Roman Berdnikov. There was no official confirmation of the change, which was also reported by other news sites.
The western military district is one of five that make up Russia’s armed forces. The reported departure of Zhuravlyov follows dramatic Russian losses in northeast Ukraine last month and the recapture by Ukraine on Saturday of Lyman, which Russia had used as an important logistics hub in Donetsk region.
Ukraine’s seizure of the initiative in the seven-month war has prompted consternation from Kremlin allies and rare public ridicule of Russia’s top brass, including at the weekend by two allies of President Vladimir Putin.
Last week the defence ministry said that the deputy minister in charge of logistics, General Dmitry Bulgakov, had been replaced.
In August, the state-owned RIA news agency reported that the commander of the Black Sea fleet had been fired after a series of humiliations including the sinking of its lead warship and the loss of eight warplanes in an attack on a Russian base in Crimea.
(Reporting by Reuters)
