MOSCOW, Aug 26 (Reuters) – The Kremlin said on Wednesday that remarks by ousted Ukrainian Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov about official corruption and alleged shortcomings in military strategy showed that Kyiv was consumed by intensifying political infighting.
Fedorov told Reuters this week that Ukraine appeared to be slowly losing the war against Russia, warning that Kyiv had a window of several months to make key decisions needed to turn the tide in its favour. He also complained about what he described as engrained corruption and patronage networks.
Asked to comment on Fedorov’s remarks, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that they were a sign of growing political infighting and accused European countries which support Ukraine of failing to notice that the ruling elite in Kyiv was destroying itself from within.
“Political, or rather, let us put it this way, quasi-political, infighting is taking place within the depths of the Kyiv regime, and it is intensifying. The Kyiv regime is collapsing from within,” Peskov said.
Ukraine’s presidential office said in response to Fedorov’s comments that he had been positive about the conduct of the war when he was at the defence ministry and the only thing that had changed was his personal status.
(Reporting by Dmitry Antonov, Writing by Alessandra Prentice Editing by Andrew Osborn)
