Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy appointed an experienced security official and corruption fighter as the acting head of the domestic security agency on Monday after abruptly sidelining his predecessor.
Zelenskiy signed a decree appointing Vasyl Maliuk as acting chief of the State Security Service (SBU), one day after the president suspended childhood friend Ivan Bakanov over what he portrayed as a failure to root out treason in the agency.
Maliuk, 39, had been first deputy head of the SBU since March 2020 and headed the Main Directorate for Combating Corruption and Organised Crime of the SBU's Central Directorate, according to his profile on the SBU website.
