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Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
Courthouse News Service Courthouse News Service

Zelenskyy orders internal purge, Russia may cut off gas to Europe

In sacking his spy chief and top prosecutor, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his government is going after hundreds of officials suspected of treason. In the European Union, meanwhile, fears grow that Russia will cut off natural gas supplies.

(CN) — Political intrigue and suspicion hung over Kyiv on Monday after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ordered a purge of top officials, including a boyhood friend he'd made his spy chief, after he said his government was filled with collaborators working for Russia.

On Sunday, Zelenskyy announced the removal of his longtime friend and former business associate Ivan Bakanov as the head of the Security Service of Ukraine and the firing of Iryna Venediktova as the prosecutor general.

It was the biggest government shakeup since the war started and suggested that not all is well behind the scenes in the corridors of power in Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital where Zelenskyy has overseen the war and become a hero in the West for staunchly resisting Russia's attacks.

Meanwhile, the war in Ukraine continued to rage on Monday, the 145th day since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Russia's southern neighbor. Russia continues to make slow advances in Donetsk, an eastern region the Kremlin is determined to occupy.

At the same time, the economic clash between Russia and the West was at risk of further escalation with fears growing that Moscow will cut off supplies of natural gas to the European Union through the Nord Stream pipeline. It is the main route for gas to Germany, the EU's economic powerhouse.

Last week, Gazprom, the Russian state-owned gas giant, closed the pipeline, citing the need to carry out yearly maintenance repairs, which are scheduled to be completed by Thursday.

But fears grew on Monday that Moscow is preparing to declare a long-term shutdown, a move that could cripple European economies. Those fears were sparked by a Reuters report about Gazprom sending European customers a letter saying it cannot guarantee gas supplies because of “extraordinary” circumstances.

Separately, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen traveled to Azerbaijan Monday to secure a deal on increasing gas flows to Europe. Azerbaijan said it would double its supplies to Europe by 2027. Still, even if Baku doubles its flows to 20 billion cubic meters a year, as it promises, that will be far from enough to meet Europe's gas needs. The pipeline for Azeri gas, the Trans Adriatic Pipeline, can only provide about 4% of Europe’s current gas consumption of roughly 500 billion cubic meters a year.

The EU has long faced criticism for building a gas line from Azerbaijan to Italy both on human rights and environmental grounds. Since 2003, Freedom House said President Ilham Aliyev and his family have overseen a deeply corrupt authoritarian regime.

Von der Leyen's trip to Azerbaijan mirrored a trip by U.S. President Joe Biden to Saudi Arabia over the weekend where he sought a firm pledge from Riyadh to increase oil production to ease a global energy crisis.

But Biden's trip failed to yield such a promise, prompting oil prices to go even higher on Monday. Biden's trip to meet Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who U.S. intelligence accuse of ordering the killing of Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, also raised unsavory questions for the White House.

In Ukraine, meanwhile, Zelenskyy's purge was fueling speculation about the state of his government.

In a statement, Zelenskyy said there were numerous individuals working under Bakanov and Venediktova suspected of treason for collaborating with the enemy.

The firing of Bakanov – a longtime friend who worked with Zelenskyy's television production company, Kvartal 95 Studio, before they turned to politics – was seen as a move to hold him responsible for the quick fall of Kherson, a city on the Black Sea, to Russian forces at the outset of the war.

But there were also allegations about top security officials close to Bakanov involved in smuggling and fleeing their posts when the war started.

Bakanov, 47, was instrumental in transforming Zelenskyy from a television comedian into a politician. Zelenskyy starred in the television role of a fictitious Ukrainian teacher-turned-president before he won the presidency in a landslide in 2019. He took over as president on a platform to end a long-simmering war between Ukraine's army and pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, but his pledges to build peace quickly fizzled out.

There was no immediate statement from Bakanov about his removal, according to Ukrainian news accounts.

Venediktova, 43, was overseeing efforts to gather information about alleged Russian war crimes with the goal to carry out prosecutions against hundreds of Russian troops and commanders. But she'd faced accusations of allowing bribery investigations to be sabotaged. On Monday, she issued a statement that questioned the legality of her dismissal, according to Strana, a Ukrainian news outlet.

Both Venediktova and Bakanov are under investigation.

Zelenskyy said 651 criminal proceedings for treason and collaboration have been launched against “employees of prosecutor's offices, pretrial inquiry bodies, and other law enforcement agencies.”

In addition, he said more than 60 employees of the prosecutor's office and the Security Service of Ukraine, or SBU, who were working in areas now under Russian control have gone over to work for the enemy.

“Six months into the war, we continue to uncover loads of these people in each of these agencies,” said Andriy Smirnov, the deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office.

The purge was a reminder that Ukrainian politics has long been plagued by intrigue, dangerous undercurrents and divided loyalties with many in Ukraine viewing Russia favorably. Ever since gaining independence in 1991, Ukrainian political life has been characterized by bloody power struggles, far-reaching corruption and criminal activity. There are, for example, concerns that Western arms being shipped to Ukraine may end up being illegally sold on the black market, as reported by the Financial Times and other news outlets.

The purge also may add to concerns that Zelenskyy is becoming an authoritarian leader because he's outlawed opposition political parties and banned numerous media outlets he considers pro-Russian.

Courthouse News reporter Cain Burdeau is based in the European Union.

Follow @cainburdeau
Categories / Energy, Government, International, Politics

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