Arestovich shared his handwritten letter of resignation, addressed to Andrey Yermak, Zelensky’s chief-of-staff, on Tuesday morning.
He claimed he was showing “an example of civilized behavior” by leaving his position in the Ukrainian government.
Later on Tuesday RT on its telegram channel quoted RIA that Zelensky accepted Arestovich’s resignation.
The presidential aide previously described his remark as “a serious mistake, made during a live broadcast.”
“The level of hate directed at me is incomparable with the consequences of the on-air mistake,” Arestovich said. He offered apologies to those “deeply hurt” but his words, but not “to the people who are spinning this issue.”
He previously claimed that he'd received a tip from an acquaintance, an experienced military expert, who said he'd heard a blast from an interceptor missile before the Russian missile hit the residential building in Dnepr on Saturday. He reported it during a YouTube interview the same day.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry denied having engaged the projectile and claimed that, in the first place, it didn’t have the capability to intercept Kh-22 air-launched cruise missiles. It claimed that its previous statements that some missiles of that model had been intercepted were “inaccurate.”
Ukrainian officials reported on Tuesday that the incident in Dnepr claimed at least 40 lives and injured 79 persons, while 25 were listed as missing. The Russian Defense Ministry said it was attacking military targets and elements of the Ukrainian energy infrastructure during the Saturday barrage. The Kremlin blamed Kyiv for the deaths of civilians, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov stating that “this tragedy was the result of the actions of the air defense missiles.”
MP/PR
21:29 - 2023/01/17
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