Ukraine invasion: Putin allies dropping out, as Russia’s losses mount

Resignation of a senior Russian government official and his reported move abroad was not the first voluntary departure of a person from a state job since the start of Russia’s war with Ukraine, but it certainly was one of the most striking.

Anatoly Chubais, who was President Vladimir Putin’s envoy to international organizations on sustainable development, is well known in Russia. He held high profile posts for nearly three decades, beginning under Boris Yeltsin, the first post-Soviet leader.

A number of public figures have condemned the invasion of Ukraine and left their posts at state-run institutions and companies, which could signal divisions in Russia’s official ranks over the war. So far there have been no indications that the resignations have reached into Putin’s inner circle.

The handful of departures came as Putin blasted those opposing his course as “scum and traitors,” which Russian society would spit out “like a gnat.”

Some of the high-profile figures who have turned their backs on the Kremlin because of the war:

On Wednesday, the Kremlin confirmed media reports about the resignation of Chubais, 66, who was the architect of Yeltsin’s privatization campaign. The reports, citing anonymous sources, said he stepped down because of the war. He hasn’t publicly commented on his resignation.

Russia-Ukraine war

Under Yeltsin, Chubais reportedly recommended the administration hire Putin, a move that was widely seen as an important stepping stone in Putin’s career. Putin became president of Russia in 2000, when Yeltsin stepped down.

Chubais also was deputy prime minister from 1994 to 1996 and first deputy prime minister from 1997-98.

The Russian business newspaper Kommersant reported Wednesday that Chubais was seen in Istanbul this week and ran a photo of a man resembling him at a Turkish ATM. Since the start of the invasion, Istanbul has taken in many Russians looking to relocate.

Arkady Dvorkovich once served as Russia’s deputy prime minister and is currently chairman of the International Chess Federation, or FIDE. He criticized the war with Ukraine in comments made to Mother Jones magazine on March 14 and came under fire from the Kremlin’s ruling party.

“Wars are the worst things one might face in life. Any war. Anywhere. Wars do not just kill priceless lives. Wars kill hopes and aspirations, freeze or destroy relationships and connections. Including this war,” he said.

Dvorkovich added that FIDE was “making sure there are no official chess activities in Russia or Belarus, and that players are not allowed to represent Russia or Belarus in official or rated events until the war is over and Ukrainian players are back in chess.”

Meanwhile, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg turned on Belarus with a clear warning to the country’s Pro-Putin leadership. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has allowed his territory to be used by the Kremlin as a launchpad for operations against Ukraine. And earlier this week reports suggested Minsk was preparing to intervene directly in the conflict.

Russia has used Belarusian territory as a staging post for its attack on Ukraine and the Ukrainian president’s office on Sunday warned it saw a high risk of an attack on western Ukraine’s Volyn region being launched from Belarus.

Ukraine said on Thursday that its troops had pushed back Russian forces from some areas around Kyiv but that Russia had not given up hope of surrounding and seizing the Ukrainian capital.

“In some sectors the enemy was driven back by more than 70 km (44 miles), in some sectors, the enemy is at a distance of 35 km,” Defence Ministry spokesperson Oleksander Motuzyanyk told a televised briefing.

Without citing evidence, he said the Kremlin had been sending additional military equipment to Belarus to reinforce its troops attacking Kyiv.

It comes as the UK and Nato allies urged China not to back Russia’s war effort in Ukraine or help Vladimir Putin escape the sanctions imposed following the invasion.

Secretary-General Stoltenberg called on Beijing to use its “significant influence” on Russia to press for an immediate peaceful resolution to the crisis.

In a joint statement, the alliance’s leaders, including Boris Johnson, called on China to “cease amplifying the Kremlin’s false narratives” about the war and Nato.

“We call on all states, including the People’s Republic of China (PRC), to uphold the international order including the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity, as enshrined in the UN Charter, to abstain from supporting Russia’s war effort in any way, and to refrain from any action that helps Russia circumvent sanctions,” they said.

The UK’s International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan suggested Xi Jinping’s country could be hit with sanctions if it supplied arms to Russia, in the same way, Belarus had been targeted with economic measures.

“We’ve sanctioned Belarus right alongside Russia precisely because they basically said feel free to park your tanks on our lawn,” she said.

“That is just not acceptable.

“Anyone who wants to support the outrageous and illegal invasion of a democratic nation needs to be cognisant of what they’re doing and the impacts that is going to have elsewhere.”

Last Wednesday, NATO estimated 7,000 to 15,000 Russian troops have been killed in the four weeks of war.

For comparison, Russia lost about 15,000 soldiers over 10 years in Afghanistan.

According to a senior NATO military official speaking on condition of anonymity, the figures are based on information from Ukrainian authorities, data released by the Kremlin and intelligence collected from open sources.

As per Ukraine’s General Staff of Armed Forces, Russia has also lost 530 tanks, 1,597 armoured vehicles, 108 planes, 124 helicopters and 50 drones.

Moscow rarely updates the figures of its military losses. The last time it did so, was on March 2, when it said 498 servicemen had been killed in Ukraine.

But a line in an article about the war in pro-Kremlin paper Komsomolskaya Pravda on March 21 read: “According to Russian defence ministry data … 9,861 Russian soldiers had been killed in action and another 16,153 had been wounded.”

The publication shortly after deleted the line and claimed its site had been hacked.

It said in a statement on its website: “Access to the administrative interface was hacked on the Komsomolskaya Pravda website and a fake was made in this publication about the situation around the special operation in Ukraine.

“The false information was immediately deleted.”

While it is unclear how Komsomolskaya Pravda could have gained access to those figures — nor if they are true — the numbers suggest, once again, Russian troops are suffering significant losses.

President Putin publicly condemned remarks on the death toll among his military.

He said in a speech last week: “The collective West is trying to divide our society.”

By “speculating on military losses”, he added, nations are trying to “provoke a civil rebellion in Russia”.