Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has appointed Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine's military intelligence agency, as his new chief of staff. This decision comes shortly after the resignation of his predecessor, Andriy Yermak, amid investigations into corruption.
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“I like the darkness,” he said.
The
survivor of 10 known assassination attempts, he lives, more or less
continuously, in this office on the outskirts of the capital, encamped
with patriotic art and war memorabilia on the walls and his pet frog
Petro swimming in a tank beside his desk.
- Budanov’s métier is running attacks behind enemy lines in Russian-occupied territory and Russia itself.
- But the spy chief rarely takes credit for them, keeping Moscow and the rest of the world guessing about his directorate’s reach and abilities. In his department’s latest feats this week, it flew attack drones as far as St Petersburg, striking an oil terminal, and targeted a gunpowder factory and an oil depot in Bryansk region, just north of the Ukrainian border.
- The brazen tactics have at times irked Ukraine’s western backers; some fear it will provoke a brutal and perhaps even nuclear response from Russian President Vladimir Putin. The spy chief is unmoved by such concerns and vows to keep operating deep inside Russia to sabotage Putin’s war machine.
“Everything we have done, we will continue to do.”
- Budanov knows this will be a trying year for Ukraine, now fighting Russia for more than a decade since the Kremlin’s soldiers, without insignia, appeared in Crimea and the eastern Ukrainian Donbas region.
“To say that there is a catastrophe is also not true.”
Ukraine will still manage to keep Putin at bay, he predicted, and has already proved that “the whole legend of [Russia’s] power is a soap bubble”.
A former special forces soldier
who fought in the Donbas in 2014, Budanov has himself taken part in
secret missions, including in the occupied Crimean peninsula.
- He was appointed to run the GUR by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2020.
- His covert operations — the Kremlin blamed the GUR for an explosion on the Crimean bridge in October 2022 — have revitalised the agency, which long played second fiddle to Ukraine’s much larger domestic security service, the SBU.
- For this Budanov enjoys an almost cult status among Ukrainians, who share memes with his likeness on social media when military equipment explodes in Russia or Russian-controlled areas. But it has come at a cost.
Sunday, July 14, 2024
Ukraine Spy Chief said There were Many Attempts to Assasinate Russian President Vladimir Putin
Kyrylo
Budanov, head of the Main Intelligence Agency (GUR) of the Ministry of
Defense of Ukraine, said that Vladimir Putin had already survived
attempts on his life.
As the Russian invasion of Ukraine approaches its four-year anniversary, a major goal for the Ukrainian government will be to secure concrete security guarantees from the West as it continues discussions on how to end the war.
According to the Financial Times, Budanov is one of the few Ukrainian senior officials who still regularly communicates
with Moscow throughout the war, most notably on prisoner exchanges.
Should peace talks with the United States, Europe, and Ukraine progress,
Budanov could serve as a valuable asset during the ongoing
negotiations, as he could potentially broker discussions with his
Russian counterparts.
- For this to occur, however, the Russian Federation would first need to state that it supports the peace efforts led by the United States.
- Russia would then need to agree to the points outlined in these negotiations.
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