KYIV, Ukraine(National times)- Ukraine\u2019s top military commander said Thursday he visited troops holding the front line in a key eastern city besieged by Russian forces, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy grappled with the fallout from a corruption scandal that has engulfed his administration. After Zelenskyy\u2019s justice and energy ministers quit Wednesday amid the investigation into alleged energy sector graft, the government fired the vice president of Energoatom, the state-owned nuclear power company believed by investigators to be at the center of the kickback scheme. The heads of Energoatom\u2019s finance, legal and procurement departments and a consultant to Energoatom\u2019s president were also dismissed in the clear-out, Prime Minister Yuliia Svyrydenko said late Wednesday. A Kyiv court has begun hearing evidence from anti-corruption watchdogs whose 15-month investigation, including 1,000 hours of wiretaps, has brought the detention of five people and implicated another seven in the scheme that allegedly earned about $100 million. Tymur Mindich, a co-owner of Zelenskyy\u2019s Kvartal 95 media production company, is the conspiracy\u2019s suspected mastermind. His whereabouts are unknown. The investigation has prompted questions about what the country\u2019s highest officials knew of the scheme. It has also awakened memories of Zelenskyy\u2019s attempt last summer to curtail Ukraine\u2019s anti-corruption watchdogs. He backtracked after widespread street protests in Ukraine and pressure from the European Union, which has pushed the country to address entrenched corruption. While Ukrainians expressed anger and disbelief at the unfolding scandal, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU would disburse Thursday a 6 billion euros ($7 billion) loan to Ukraine and promised more money for Kyiv. \u201cWe will cover the financial needs of Ukraine for the next two years,\u201d she said in a speech to the European Parliament. The EU and other foreign partners have poured money into Ukraine\u2019s energy sector. Russia has relentlessly bombarded the power grid, which requires repeated repairs. The EU is looking into how it can come up with more money for Ukraine, either by seizing frozen Russian assets, raising funds on capital markets, or having some of the 27 EU nations raise the money themselves. Russian President Vladimir Putin \u201cthinks he can outlast us\u201d in the battle over Ukraine\u2019s future, nearly four years after Russia\u2019s all-out invasion of its neighbor, von der Leyen said. \u201cAnd this is a clear miscalculation,\u201d she said. \u201cNow is therefore the moment to come, with a new impetus, to unlock Putin\u2019s cynical attempt to buy time and bring him to the negotiation table.\u201d Meanwhile, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, Ukraine\u2019s top military commander, visited units fighting to hold Pokrovsk in the eastern Donetsk region and coordinate operations in person, he said on the messaging app Telegram. Ukrainian troops are locked in street battles with Russian forces in the city and fighting to prevent becoming surrounded by a bigger Russian force as Russia\u2019s war of attrition slowly grinds across the countryside.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
KYIV, Ukraine(National times)- Ukraine\u2019s top military commander said Thursday he visited troops holding the front line in a key eastern city besieged by Russian forces, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy grappled with the fallout from a corruption scandal that has engulfed his administration. After Zelenskyy\u2019s justice and energy ministers quit Wednesday amid the investigation into […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":115694,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-115693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","entry"],"yoast_head":"\n