Ukraine in Arabic | Ukrainian Parliament appointed new defense minister
Ukraine in Arabic/ The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (Parliament) has appointed Stepan Poltorak to the post of defense minister at the request of President Petro Poroshenko. This is the fourth change in leadership since Russia's annexation of Crimea in March.
A total of 245 lawmakers supported the candidacy of Poltorak, who was nominated by President Petro Poroshenko Monday.
The head of Ukraine's National Guard, Stepan Poltorak, will take over for Valeriy Heletey, who resigned amid heavy criticism for the crushing defeat of Ukrainian forces east of Donetsk in late August.
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said: “I had an opportunity to talk to regular soldiers during my trip to the anti-terrorist operation zone, and to commanders. The conversations convinced me in the correctness of my decision”.
The nomination comes as hundreds of Ukrainian national guardsmen protested outside the presidential palace.
They are angry that despite finishing their military service they are not being allowed home and they want the government to release them from the army.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov are scheduled to meet in Paris on Tuesday with Ukraine and the pullback of Russian troops from the border at the top of their agenda.
On Sunday, Putin ordered more than 17,000 troops to withdraw from an area near the Ukrainian border as he prepares to meet with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko later in the week on the sidelines of an Asia-Europe summit in Milan.
Ukrainian military forces have been fighting independence supporters in the country's southeastern regions since mid-April, when Kiev launched its military operation in the area in response to local residents' refusal to recognize the new government, which came to power as a result of the February coup.
According to the latest UN estimates, almost 3,700 people have been killed in Ukraine and over 8,800 have been wounded since the start of the Kiev military operation.