Kyiv protests over Fedorov's dismissal: what happened by 19 July 2026
A look back at the demonstrations that followed the removal of Mykhailo Fedorov as Minister of Defence, and the resignation that came with them.
What did the dismissal of a defence minister do to the streets of Ukraine's cities? By 19 July 2026, the question was already being answered in public, after several days of demonstrations over President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's decision to remove Mykhailo Fedorov.
The dismissal
On 15 July, the president dismissed Fedorov as Minister of Defence, and the decision prompted protests in Ukraine. The following day, 16 July, demonstrations were held in Kyiv and in other cities across the country. They were directed against the president's choice to replace Fedorov with major-general Yevhenii Khmara.
A resignation in protest
The reaction was not confined to the streets. On 16 July, Pavlo Yelizarov, deputy commander of the Ukrainian Air Force, resigned from his position. He did so in protest at Fedorov's removal.
Second day near the Presidential Office
On 17 July, the protests continued for a second day in Kyiv, near the Presidential Office Building. Demonstrators there demanded that Fedorov be returned as Minister of Defence. They also called for the resignation of Oleksandr Syrskyi as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Where matters stood
Taken together, the events of 15 to 17 July set out the shape of the dispute as it stood going into the weekend of 19 July 2026. A dismissal announced by the president had been followed by street demonstrations in the capital and other cities, by a senior Air Force officer stepping down, and by demands that went beyond the ministry to the leadership of the armed forces.
The protesters' demands were specific: Fedorov's return to the ministry and Syrskyi's departure from his post. The president's choice of Khmara, a major-general, as the replacement remained the decision they were contesting.
The episode unfolded while Ukraine's war continued, and while, separately, anti-war protests were also taking place in Russia. On 13 July, Russian anti-war politician Boris Nadezhdin was detained over a video on his social media account featuring the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, days after he was designated a foreign agent. He was later released from a police station and was due to appear in court on 17 July. That case was a distinct matter from the Kyiv demonstrations, but it formed part of the wider picture of public protest linked to the war in the region that month.
For readers looking back, the sequence of 15, 16 and 17 July is the core of the story: a dismissal, a wave of protests across several cities, a resignation in the Air Force command, and a continuing demonstration outside the president's offices in Kyiv.
