Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba Resigns Ahead of Cabinet Reshuffle

KYIV — Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba resigned Wednesday, following an announcement last week from President Volodymyr Zelensky that a Cabinet reshuffle was imminent.

Kuleba’s resignation request will be discussed by lawmakers at the next plenary meeting, Speaker of parliament Ruslan Stefanchuk said on his Facebook page.

The foreign minister’s resignation came as at least seven people were killed and 35 injured in an overnight strike on Lviv, city Mayor Andrii Sadovyi said Wednesday morning.

A child and a medical worker were among the dead and others are in critical condition, he said.

The attack happened a day after two ballistic missiles blasted a Military academy and nearby hospital in Poltava in Ukraine, killing more than 50 people and wounding more than 200 others, Ukrainian officials said, in one of the deadliest Russian strikes since the war began.

The missiles tore into the heart of the Poltava Military Institute of Communication’s main building, causing several stories to collapse.

The missiles hit shortly after an air-raid alert sounded, when many people were on their way to a bomb shelter, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said, describing the strike Tuesday as “barbaric.”

Poltava is about 350 kilometers (200 miles) southeast of Kyiv, on the main highway and rail route between Kyiv and Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, which is close to the Russian border.

The attack happened as Ukrainian forces sought to carve out their holdings in Russia’s Kursk border region after a surprise Ukrainian incursion that began Aug. 6 and as the Russian army hacks its way deeper into eastern Ukraine.