Overview
- Budanow accepted Zelenskyy’s offer to take over the Presidential Office, succeeding Andriy Yermak after his late-November resignation following anti-corruption searches.
- Zelenskyy said the office will concentrate on security issues, the development of Ukraine’s defense and security forces, and the diplomatic track of negotiations.
- Budanow has led Ukraine’s military intelligence service, HUR, since 2020 and was praised by Zelenskyy as experienced and able to deliver results.
- Ukraine’s leadership has been shaken for weeks by a bribery scandal that has put senior officials under pressure.
- Yermak, a longtime Zelenskyy confidant and Ukraine’s lead interlocutor with U.S. counterparts, departs a role central to Kyiv’s negotiating architecture.