Zelensky vows to continue reforms next week

President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Aug. 5 that he will carry on with reforms next week to strengthen state institutions.

"Whoever a person is - either a military commissar, a deputy, or an official - everyone should work only for the sake of the state. So it will be," Zelensky said in his evening address.

Zelensky's vow comes as law enforcement cracked down on military enlistment officers in multiple regions this week, detaining officials who are accused of helping criminals avoid justice and allegedly allowing draft-age men to evade mobilization by leaving Ukraine.

"There will be no more old formats in our state," Zelensky said.

"Those formats when some defended the state and people, while others tried to put both the state and people at the service of their own benefit," he added.

Earlier this year, Zelensky launched the largest wartime government reshuffle in January, ousting a deputy head of the President's Office, a deputy prosecutor general, several deputy ministers, and several governors were ousted following a number of scandals –  including corruption ones.

Risk of ‘big disruptions’ high in grain markets, says Black Sea expert

Since Russia refused to renew the Black Sea Grain Initiative – a U.N.-brokered deal to keep Ukraine’s grain flowing from its Black Sea ports amid Russia’s full-scale invasion – it has unleashed a campaign of attacks on Ukraine’s port and grain infrastructure. In late July, Russia carried

The Kyiv IndependentLili Bivings