What is Ukraine's contingency plan if President Volodymyr Zelenskyy gets killed? Anthony Blinken answers
PremiumThis comes amid reports of Zelenskyy having dodged at least three assassination attempts last week
If Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy gets killed during Russia's military offensive, a contingency plan will be put in place by the government of the country to deal with the situation, confirmed US secretary of state Antony Blinken in a recent interview.
"The Ukrainians have plans in place – that I am not going to talk about or get into any details on – to make sure that there is what we would call ‘continuity of government’ one way or another. And let me leave it at that," Blinken said when he was asked if the United States was working on an interim plan to support a Ukrainian government without Zelenskyy.
He also went on praise the leadership shown by the Ukrainian president and his entire government.
“First of all, let me say this, the leadership that president Zelenskyy has shown, the entire government has shown is remarkable. They've been the embodiment of this incredibly brave Ukrainian people," he said.
This comes amid reports of Zelenskyy having dodged at least three assassination attempts last week.
According to a report by the Times of London, the attempts were foiled after anti-war Russians fed intel to authorities in Ukraine about two separate mercenary groups of the Kremlin-backed Wagner group and Chechen special forces, who planned to launch the attacks.
“I can say that we have received information from [Russia’s Federal Security Service], who do not want to take part in this bloody war," Ukraine secretary of national security and defence was quoted as saying by the Times.
He said that as many as 400 Wagner Group members are still in Kyiv and are aiming to kill 24 officials in the Ukrainian government.
The 44-year-old president also survived an assassination attempt on Saturday on the outskirts of the country's capital Kyiv when a group of Chechen assassins were taken out before they could get to him.
Meanwhile, a Russian delegation on Monday departed for Belarus where it will meet Ukrainian negotiators for the third round of talks about ending hostilities.
Last week, the sides agreed to open humanitarian corridors to allow civilians out of some combat zones, but none of them has worked so far, with the sides accusing each other of violating local ceasefire.
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